


Our Universe

by Osci



Category: Destiny (Video Games), Monster Hunter (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Character Development, F/F, M/M, War
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-15
Updated: 2020-01-15
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:13:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 44
Words: 74,881
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22261642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Osci/pseuds/Osci
Summary: What happens when two worlds come together, one graced by the Traveler, one thriving without it?The Vex are toying with guardians and hunters, and it's the job of two leaders to find out just what is happening on Venus.
Relationships: Original Character/Original Character
Comments: 7
Kudos: 9





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've been working on this project for about one and a half years now. It started out as a silly idea with my best friend, but I never thought I'd get so attached to the characters and story. If you come across this, I hope you enjoy reading it as this is something that's made me realize that I want to become a writer.
> 
> Everything from font to tags and summary will be sorted out once I finish uploading everything.

EXO: Cero-0  
Class: Nightstalker  
Revival location: Spain  
Ghost name: Codex  
Fireteam role: Strike Leader  
Fireteam members:  
Awoken Titan - Alric  
EXO Warlock - Deji-8  
Apartment number: 2510

It was 5 am, Cero dived into her bed fully armored, helmet on. Her entire body was made of metal anyway, so what would it matter if she wore her gear? The guardian was content until she moved slightly, and heard, actually *heard* sand crunch on her bed as she reajusted her sorry pose.

Sighing, she sat up and removed her grimy, mud slathered helmet to look at the mess she created on her pillowcase.

"Why am I so unlucky?", she asked to nothing in particular, her head antennae drooping slightly when not even her ghost would answer her.

"Can you at least cheer me up? I went through hell on that stupid scout mission and even lost my rifle!", she raised her voice now, and her ghost finally popped up out of thin air.

"Cero. You did good," he said in a low, buzzing voice.

"You're kidding me. Are you kidding me?" She looked at Codex with disbelief and he just stared back at her.

"At least try to sound sincere," the hunter muttered, the purple colour inside her mouth illuminating the tiny AI.

"Go to bed. You know we are both extremely agitated when we are discharged," Codex said matter of factly. Cero gave an eyeroll and took off her dirty cloak.

"I sleep. I don't charge," Cero muttered and dumped the rest of her gear on the floor. She'd clean it tomorrow. Right now, she deserved rest, and time to mourn her lost scout rifle.

Cero had gone on a solo mission, trying to make sense of the Vex, robotic enemies which were literal murder machines that teleported and warped time, and why they were regrouping on Venus. She didn't get much smarter as all she found out was that they were guarding some kind of portal. Nothing new. Though, it was filled with high class units and she frowned at the unusual setup. Why did they care so much about yet another portal? She'd have to report this when she's back on duty. Maybe check it out with Alric. The guy was known for his slight obsession with Vex after that one mission on the moon.

The small guardian sighed and stood up from her muddy bed, instead choosing to crash on the couch for the night.

-

Opening her eyes, Cero was woken up by a series of knocks on her wooden apartment door. She tried to ignore it, until the knocks turned into impatient bangs. She sighed and closed her eyes briefly before opening them again and accepting her fate.

"Yeah, yeah! Calm down!" She yelled and stood up, quickly throwing on a hoodie and walking towards the cause of her disgruntled mood.

"What," she said as she opened the door and saw the chest of an all too fimiliar vanguard hunter, and upon raising her head, she saw him stare at her with mild amusement as he looked at her interesting choice of gear. A white ketchup stained hoodie and grey, laced panties.

"C-Cayde!?" Cero shrieked and slammed the door shut in a panic. She turned around and grabbed her head in frustration and embarrasment before steeling herself and opening the door a tiny bit, enough for her head to poke through and talk to the vanguard, who was desperately trying to remain calm despite having to muffle his laugh.

"What brings you here, sir?" Cero asked, choosing to ignore the fact she just showed Cayde-6 her undergarments and said man cleared his artificial throat awkwardly.

"We, uh, need you for a report and another mission on Venus. Activity has picked up significantly and the last hunter we sent has returned but is currently in the ICU facing serious injuries. His ghost refuses to inform us on what happened," he stated and Cero nodded.

"I'll come as soon as I can. But surely this isn't the only reason you're at my door?" She asked, tilting her head slightly.

"It's 10 am and you were expected at the meeting hall at 8. I figured you might've drowned in your cereal so I wanted to check up on you," he said with a shrug and Cero blinked once, twice, before allowing her jaw to drop open in disbelief.

"Oh man. I am so sorry- I arrived back at the hangar at 5 in the morning- I-" she was cut off by Cayde's index finger covering her mouth, effectively shutting her up.

"I know. I was at the hangar when I saw you stumble over your own feet from exhaustion. That's why I'm here instead of Ikora. Get dressed, chop chop. We already lost time with this whole conversation," he shoved her back inside her apartment without much force, but still enough so she couldn't protest.

-

"I found out the large movement was a bunch of high class Vex trying to keep strangers out of the area. They were guarding a portal. I don't know the purpose of it as I was unable to fight my way through the horde. I will try again with my fireteam today if you want," Cero said, looking at Zavala directly. The commander sighed and observed the map of the area Cero was talking about. The entire vanguard was gathered around the petite guardian, frowns on their faces upon hearing the news. It was bad. Vex usually didn't plan something so big within such a small time, given the fact they treated time differently from other beings in the solar system. No one knew their motive this time.

"Gather your things, then. We need to stop whatever they're planning," Zavala answered and the small Exo nodded before turning on her heels and walking out of the meeting hall. Her black cloak slightly dragging across the floor.

Today, her gear consisted of a black helmet with some purple holo lights, adorned with a stamp of her fireteam logo. An oversized black cloak with slight claw rips from Hive attacks rested on her shoulders and her chest piece was simple, customized with an ammo belt for easy access to her machine gun ammo. Her gauntlets had an Ahamkara skull on her left side, together with part of a spine. It was freaky, but it increased her grenade efficiency. Maybe the spirit granted her some spooky power, who knew. Her belt was simple, the holster of her hand cannon a stark purple, the top of her Crimson peeking out of it. Her pants were light armor with a belt around her right leg for a hunting knife, and her boots were made for stealthy movement.

She slowed her pace as she approached the gunsmith, eyeing the assortment of scout rifles. She sighed as none of them even came close to the godly weapon she had and heard Banshee give a questioning hum.

"Oh. Lost my rifle," she muttered at the EXO. He looked at her for a moment before turning around and digging through a box of random guns. She raised her brow plate slightly, curiosity poking at her.

"This one?" He said after a slight moment and turned around with Cero's gun, grinning proudly.

"How did you.. when!?" She came closer and took the rifle, observing it, trying to make sense of how it returned unscathed.

"That hunter that's now in the ICU after trying to be a hero, he came back with his ship and Amanda Holliday saw he had your rifle safely stored in a bag, together with the customized ammo rounds you order from me each month. Pay him a visit," he said, giving Cero the EXO variant of a raised brow. The small hunter looked bewildered, and yelled a quick "Thank you" before running off to the right side of the tower.

-

"It's important. I have a potential clue that might get his ghost to talk about the mission," Cero insisted to the nurse. The guardian had taken off the hood of her cloak, her antennae moving up and down as if expressing distress.

"Okay, but only a short while," the nurse said with her lips pushed into a thin line, opening the glass door to the bed with the injured human hunter occupying it. His ghost was idly floating above him, and was surprised to see Cero walking up to the machine littered bed and grabbing a chair to sit next to the uncouncious guardian.

"Who are you?" the ghost asked. Cero said nothing, but carefully took her rifle from below her cloak, showing it to the AI.

"Oh. It's you," he said and floated closer to her, observing her.

"What happened out there?" She asked. The ghost was quiet for a moment, clearly needing time to set aside his sadness and tell the concerned EXO about the catastrophe that happened on Venus.

"We got ambushed. Your rifle was the bait. After Avon picked it up, about 100 Vex teleported towards us. He ran, and in the panic, fell on his head down a slope. Vex caught up with him and started hitting him, treating him like some target practice. It's like they played with him. He made it to the ship, but I had to pilot it since he passed out shortly after entering. Amanda carried him to the hospital wing. Those Vex allowed him to leave, but I don't know why. It seems so unnecessary," he threw all the info she needed onto her at once, and Cero was left speechless. The Vex used bait to lure a guardian into a trap, and then let him leave. Why? She looked at Avon, the hunter who was unfortunate enough to end up as a plaything for soulless murderers. She frowned and her mouth illuminated with the purple glow she was known for. It was like she wanted to scream, needed a way to let out the dreadful situation downing upon her. Cero wasn't careful on her last mission, and thus ended up hurting a fellow guardian with her stupid mistake.

"Thank you for telling me. The vanguard needs to know this, though. I hope you can explain it to them soon," she looked at the ghost who seemed like he had all the light knocked out from him. He kept quiet. "I'm going back to Venus with my team to get intel on what the hell is happening there. Tell Avon that I'm thankful that he picked my rifle up, even if it ended up just being bait," she said the last word with a bitter tone, standing up and leaving a single customized black and purple bullet, a tiny white zero etched into it, on his nightstand as a sort of way of thanking him, since her words currently fell on deaf ears.

The hunter turned around without a sound and went out of the suffocating room.

She needed to find out what was going on. Avon suffered because of her blindness, and she needed to apologize to him in some way.


	2. Chapter 2

Ara woke up to the sound of the guildmaster laughing loudly. She squinted her eyes, unable to focus on the scene before her. The redhead looked down and saw a beer mug tossed to it's side with the remaining contents spilled on the worn table. The girl blinked a few times before realizing her situation.

She'd passed out drunk in the middle of the gathering hall.

Checking her pouches and zennybag quickly to see if no one robbed her, Ara sighed in relief to find everything on her safe and sound. The tall huntress stood up, wobbled over to the giggly questatrix and handed her forgotten quest back to the girl. The guildmaster eyed the drowsy hunter with a curious glance, yet chose not to comment on her appearance as he took a drag from his pipe. He's seen worse.

"Want me to cancel your hunt?" The questatrix asked with mild amusement from her lingering conversation with the old man. Ara nodded and tried to wipe her beer stained fringe out of her face. She really needed a bath and a bed.

"Alright, girl. Go get some rest. I'll see you tomorrow," she said with a warm smile and removed the stamp on the quest paper. Ara just turned around and slowly exited the hall, not bothering to say goodbye to anyone.

Val Habar was illuminated by the full moon, and the red haired woman would appreciate it if it wasn't for her head absolutely killing her. The moving town had taken a stop around an oasis, and allowed merchants and hunters to stock up on water and clean themselves before setting out again. Ara traveled all around the globe to hunt menacing monsters, but that was nothing compared to the sand stuck in her belongings everytime Val Habar had traveled a few miles. The girl loved change and challenge, but she came from a fishing town. It was hard to get used to her evermoving home, even after five years.

"Hunter!" A voice called out and Ara stopped in her sleazy tracks, turning around and seeing a man with a tear stained face running towards her hastily. It was midnight, what was he doing outside?

"Please! My child! Something took it, and claimed it to be a sacrifice!" He yelled and shook her slightly.

"Something- sacrifice?" She repeated and frowned. 'Somethings' weren't supposed to talk or claim things to be sacrifices.

"What did it look like?" Ara asked. This only made the man more hysteric, as he raised his voice with his next words.

"B-big, humanoid! Evil! It took my baby to the Everwoods!", he yelled and Ara looked at the father with confusion before standing up more straight and grabbing the crying man's hand.

"I'll see what I can do. Please tell the guild of this while I prepare for the hunt. If I don't make it back before sunrise, send out a distress call and look for hunters named Scar or Luna. They are my friends," Ara told him, determined to save his child. Completely sobered up, she ran back to her caravan and stocked up her supplies, not granting the man to talk back. This was bad. What if a new monster had popped up? An invisible monster existed, an electric monster and a virus monster too. It would make sense for something unknown to still linger around, possibly fooling humans and stealing their kids for food. But how was it able to talk?

Taking her Rimeblade, she strapped it onto her back and adjusted her boots. No time to play biologist. Ara had a child to save.

She was about to head out when she almost tripped over something blocking the door. Looking down, she saw her trusted palico, Fluffy. His name was extremely cute, but he was one of the guild's best prowlers these days.

"Out of the way, furball. I'm soloing this," she said and tried to move the support cat aside.

"You smell like that piss you hunters drink all the time. What if you pass out and land your head on a spiky rock?" he hissed and grabbed his hammer. Ara rolled her eyes and figured it might be better to have an extra pair of eyes with her anyway.

-

The Everwoods were suffocating as always, and Ara drank some dash juice before tossing the glass bottle and crouching down in the bushes. The pair had traveled for 2 hours to get to the dense, shifting forest. There was a Najarala idling around a few Aptanoth, and the hunter tried to make her way to the dark cave behind it. Something told the redhead her target would be there. But the oversized snake was in the way and screwing up her entire progress.

"Move.. stupid worm," she whispered and grit her teeth. She shouldn't alert anything big, as there was a chance her target would flee. If it was there at all. The cloaked hunter took out a dung bomb and aimed it at the Najarala, almost throwing it before she noticed it taking off.

"Thank you," she muttered and stood up, running to the area she was supposed to go. Fluffy stalked along the walls of the cave once they made it, and tried to warn her of unsteady rocks and the likes before she would get herself a concussion.

It was dark and muddy, and Ara had to restrain herself from using a torch to light up her way. She tried to be as stealthy as possible, not liking the absence of life in this place. She knew her partner was with her, the blue stone attached to his neck always telling her where he was.

It went on for a good mile, and they came to a stop in front of a small open area. Some flowers graced the ground, a blinding contrast to the darkness around it. In the middle of the flowerbed was a heap of pink fabric, and it moved around slightly. 

The child.

Ara ran to the baby and picked her up carefully, smiling at the little life being free from harm.

"Hey there. Let's get you out of here, yeah?", the redhead smiled softly at the tan skinned girl and looked around before reajusting the blanket and securely holding the baby to her chest.

"Sacrifice," the hunter heard suddenly, and took a ready stance, drawing her sword with one hand and holding the child in her other.

"Stay with me, Fluff," she whispered. The white haired palico nodded and drew his hammer. It seemed too out of character. Not ever has a monster set a trap, used a human child or spoken the common tongue to get his prey. Ara swallowed and almost winced at the dryness of her throat.

"Sacrifice," the voice said again. It was as if it echoed through her brain, unlike any voice and shrill.

"Come on then, bastard!" Ara yelled, and Fluffy followed with a low growl. She was too tired for games.

A glow emitted from their left, and she turned around to see something.. machine-like holding what looked like a heavily upgraded light bowgun with a red dot pointing towards her.

It was atleast 3 meters, had a weird aura around it and looked like it was ready to kill, walking towards the small group in a steady pace and otherworldly sounds emitting from it.

Ara wasted no time.

"RUN!", she yelled.

They evaded the shots, startled at how quickly they approached. A burning sensation graced Ara's sword arm after a failed sidestep and she tumbled to the ground, pain like needles going through her.

"Dammit, come on, boss!" Fluffy yelled and Ara and stood up, running once more. This was insane. This was madness. What was that thing?!

-

The pair didn't know how long they'd ran, but it dawned upon them that the unknown creature had stopped chasing them after they made it to the entrance of the cave.

Sitting down, Ara carefully placed the baby in her lap and removed her right gauntlet. The metal was burned and melted off, forming a nasty wound on her arm. It would heal. Her priority was something else.

Ara peered down at the child and saw that it had cried. Tear stains glowing slightly in the clear moonlight. She hadn't even noticed it in her own panic.

"I'm sorry, little girl. We're almost home," the redhead said and placed a gentle kiss onto the baby's small forehead.

"We gotta move, boss," the white haired palico stated, pulling out a white cloth from his own tiny pouch. He made quick work of Ara's arm, making sure the wound was clean before bandaging the area.

"Thanks, big guy," she said and pet her partner, earning a sincere purr from the other.

Standing up, she bit the inside of her cheek to distract herself from cursing, the adrenaline in her body fading and making place for a throbbing pain in her entire body. That fall she took was extremely unlucky.

-

It was 4 am, and the team returned to Val Habar looking like they just went through a tornado. Well, two of them. The baby was safe and sound.

Ara's hair was down and tangled, the length of her strands reaching to her hips, and the markings on her face were smudged and faded. Fluffy had lost his hat, and one of his paws was stained with blood.

Both their armor was filled with grime from the cave and they couldn't wait to take it off.

Ara made her way to the gathering hall, telling Fluffy to rest up in the caravan. It was warm inside, like always, and she saw Scar sitting next to the man who'd asked the redhead's help, trying to comfort him as best as he could.

"Lookie here, sir," she said and brushed aside the soft blanket to show the baby to the man. His face lit up, and tears started streaming down his cheeks once more. Ara grinned and placed the girl into the hands of her father, not daring to wince when the man brushed by her right arm.

"Thank you! Thank you, hunter! What is your name?" He asked, cooing the sleeping child.

"Just Ara. Go to bed, sir. I don't need a reward," she said and pushed him to the entrance. The man expresses gratitude once more and shuffled to his own caravan, clearly exhausted from the mental rollercoaster he went through.

"'Sup dude," the roughed up hunter said and plopped down on the exact same spot she woke up at 5 hours prior.

"Stop acting. What the hell happened?" Scar asked, frown on his face painfully present.

Ara rolled her eyes and raised her hand to order a beer, allowing her face to change into discomfort. The pain in her abdomen wasn't letting up.

"I encountered.. something that didn't belong in the Everwoods," she told Scar.

"Didn't belong? Like Dalamadur?", the black haired male joked. Ara shook her head.

"Dalamadur is organic. What I saw wasn't. Atleast it would make sense for a giant snake to live in the woods," she said, taking the mug a palico handed her.

"What do you mean? Not organic?" Scar tilted his head, now equally as confused as the girl who saw it.

"Maybe Fluff got a better look at it. I'll ask him once we had our rest."

"Tell higher ups," he said, worry clearly taking over his cool demeanor.

"Yeah yeah," she muttered and downed the beer in one swig.

-

"I'm not sure. It seemed to have a weird aura around it. And a clearly enhanced bowgun. A single shot burned your arm a third degree, boss. All I can say is that we need to tell His Immenseness," Fluffy said, trying to scrub leftover dirt from his coat.

"I know. I'm dreading it. What if this is the start of something awful?" She asked her partner. At the moment, she was combing her hair, getting rid of the poor decisions she made last night.

"Surely we can face it. You've been a hunter for 5 years," he said and bared his fangs, imitating a human grin. Ara smiled back and tilted her head, putting her locks into a bucket of warm water and Mizu soap.

"I'll go to His Immenseness after I do my errands. I also need to run a quick expedition, so I think I'll pick you up when it's late afternoon. We'll grab some food and get to Dundorma, sounds good?" She asked, Running her hands through the red strands. Fluffy gave a nod and the both of them continued to clean themselves in silence.

It was about 20 minutes later when Ara's caravan door was attacked by a series of knocks. The woman stood up and opened her door, causing the culprit to now knock on her left collarbone.

"Ara!", the fimiliar girl said with a wide smile. Ara almost squeaked and hugged the dual blader.

"Hey Luna!" She said after letting go and shoving her into her caravan without hesitation.

"I heard you went through some stuff last night so I wanted to help you get dolled up for the day. Am I too late?" Luna asked, eyeing Fluffy who was busy sneezing the dust from his station.

"Just in time. I can't get my hair up and marking my face is a curse since I'm right handed and my arm is burned," Ara explained, pulling out some face paint and two hairties from a small accessoiry chest on her nightstand.

"Alright. Just tell me what went down to mess you up so much. Usually you don't even let monsters touch you," the white haired hunter said, picking up a comb and sectioning Ara's bright red hair.

"Well, for starters. I ran for my life, and for a two month old baby's life, too," the grey eyed girl said and sighed. Luna stopped for a second, trying to imagine what caused her friend to end up like that.

"It was nothing like I've ever seen before. It talked," she explained further.

"What..?", Luna said and looked at Ara through the rusted mirror. The redhead just gave a shrug.

"It used the baby I needed to save as bait to try and kill me, yet it let me go once I exited the cave."

"That's ghastly. Let me join next time. Scar too," she said and tied the left part of her hair carefully.

"That's my plan if it becomes an urgent matter," the taller woman stated and looked down at her burned arm. It was wrapped in a new bandage, courtesy of Fluffy.

"I'm sorry I wasn't there, Scar said you looked scared. I should've been at your side," she whispered, combing through the right part of her hair with care.

"Nah. You were in Cathar, don't blame yourself," Ara said and turned to smile at Luna, who was looking at her friend with worry.

"Make me look cute," the redhead followed up and turned back again, relaxing when Luna giggled lightly.

-

"Ta-daaa!" Luna said after finishing the face paint and moving out of the way to allow her friend to look at herself properly.

Ara had stygian themes. Based on her hair, Luna had smudged the red paint across her eyelid. Together with her usual marks it created a mesmerizing look. Her twin tails were lower than usual, opting for a more casual style but still very eyecatching. Ara loved it.

"Thanks, Luna," the taller hunter said and stood up from her stool. Said girl bowed with a grin.

"I gotta go again, though. Guild hunters are on my butt. They assigned me an apex today and I gotta hunt it with some greenhorns, so I'll see you around," Luna said and waved, running out of the caravan without a second wasted.

"She's totally running late to her meetup," Fluffy muttered from his station and Ara laughed.

"Yeah. She wasn't even supposed to make a pit stop here. Dundorma is west from Cathar and right now Val Habar is literally south. I bet she ignored orders," the redhead said with a grin and shook her head, taking a dress from one of her clothing baskets.

The woman took off her Pajama's and observed her chest. There was a nasty, purple bruise with red marks covering her entire upper body.

"Fluff. It got worse," Ara muttered and the palico sat up, yawning before peering at his boss.

"Indeed. Lay down for a second, please," the white haired cat said, standing up and taking his medical supplies.

He jumped onto the bed, squinting at the bruise.

"It looks like you took a crag shot straight on. No armor. I didn't see you get shot more than once, though," he said, his ears folding back.

"Me neither. I fell back there but that's it. Falls don't create bruises like this."

"As long as it doesn't hurt too much I can allow you to walk one more day. If it doesn't show improvement then I'll be sending you to the Wyporium for examination, boss," he said with a sigh. Fluffy took the white dress and placed it onto the bed, but didn't leave her side just yet.

"Be careful on the expedition. I don't want you to end up missing an eye too, Or worse," he confessed, refusing to look at Ara. He heard the woman chuckle slightly, her left hand tilting his tiny head up.

"I'm fine. I'm a hunter, worrying about me is useless," she stated and scratched Fluffy's ear. He remained quiet and tip-toed back to his station.


	3. Chapter 3

Cero got out of her ship, putting on her helmet and cloak. Next to her, Alric was checking his pulse rifle magazine and made sure it wasn't going to malfunction if they ended up in a gunfight, which was likely. Deji was fooling around with his light, waiting for Cero to give the fireteam their objective.

Gain information on the portal.

The black dressed Exo took a deep breath before turning to face her fireteam, which looked more nervous than a deer caught in headlights. Deji refused to look at his leader, instead choosing to stare at his boots. Alric just bit his lower lip, a habit he practiced when he felt stressed out.

"As you know, the last report we got was from a ghost in the ICU back in the tower telling us the Vex have gained interest in toying with guardians. Next to our main objective, which is securing the portal area and finding out its purpose, I need you both to scan the area regularly and make sure to watch your tracker. Should anything happen that isn't amidst our list of tasks, contact the vanguard and report your status. In position," she stated and took out her scout rifle. Deji ceased his void light and got out his handgun. Alric put on his helmet and started following Cero.

The fireteam advanced quietly but quickly, making sure none of them would get side tracked. The three made use of tracker commands and hand gestures to venture into the Vex structures around the forest. It was extremely unsettling since it felt like they were being watched from all angles.

They were on the right way, but suddenly Deji signed them to stop walking, which was odd, since Deji usually left the strategic approaches to Cero.

"I can see three oracles," he whispered. Alric frowned and turned to look the way Deji was facing, and indeed, three bright orbs were situated in front of the place they needed to be.

"Doesn't that mean there's a Templar here?", Cero asked Alric, who gave a single nod.

"We're half a raid team. We can't face that," Deji said, picking at his handgun. He was right. The Templar was too much for a team of three, even if they knew what they were doing.

"I'll go stealth. Stand by," Cero stated and didn't wait for an affirmative. 

The Exo knew it was a risky move. Possibly sacrificing herself in order to gain intel seemed irrational. But she was small and fast, so maybe she had a chance. Gaining information was critical and she wouldn't be called a strike leader if she didn't take risks.

The hunter made sure to stay out of the machine's eyesight, waiting for the right moment to get closer to her goal. 

The Vex didn't seem to notice her or her fireteam. Cero crawled beneath a tree root close to the portal, gazing at the size of the thing. It seemed to be a warp gate of some sorts. The hunter took another step closer to see what could be on the other side. She was in reach of the gate, but suddenly heard a shriek from a harpy nearby.

"Shit," she hissed and blinked her tracker position. The other two needed to run before hell broke loose.

So far, only the harpy seemed the know Cero's location, but it got worse as she noticed the Templar's gaze fixing onto her position once she tried to back off from the shrieking machine. It alerted the entire area.

Grabbing her hand cannon and aiming, she pulled the trigger and caused the harpy to explode with her bullet. Cero looked around, not seeing an option for escape. She noticed her fireteam had contacted the tower, and saw them shoot their way into the chaos in an attempt to rescue their leader. Cero growled and fought off a goblin trying to pummel her into the ground with it's gun. 'Use the thing to shoot, not as a damn hammer,' she thought and shot it straight in its core. The liquid from said core got all over her, frying some of her gear. She noticed Deji was frantically trying to run away from a hydra. He did fine until the monstrous machine shot at his leg, effectively burning his wires and resulting in him falling and groaning in pain.

"Get out of here! Abort!", Cero yelled at the two and evaded a grenade, the thing bouncing once more before detonating and incinerating the grass not far from her. The machines got closer and seemed to multiply. Groups of teleporting Vex shot at the guardians, and Cero saw Alric grabbing a barely councious Deji and running behind a pillar before the exo got pushed back by a minotaur. Her vision went white as the fimiliar feeling of warping overtook her.

No.

Cero was teleporting to a different place.

"Dammit," she growled as her vision returned, landing ungracefully into a tree with red leaves. The petite hunter took a moment to regain her senses before looking down at the ground, realizing she was above what seemed like a camp. There was only one tent though. The exo sighed and slid down the trunk of the tree, careful not to make too much noise.

Cero's comms were dead, she knew the moment she started warping. Whatever Alric was yelling at her via her radio became static, and ultimately turned into nothing at all, which was slightly concerning since the guardian wasn't getting jammed and she was on the surface of.. wherever she was.

She crouched down and entered the tent, taking a random book from the worn and moldy desk resting in the corner of the camp. It looked recently used.

Opening it, she noticed the language wasn't from her own solar system. It seemed to resemble absolutely zero of what Cero knew. And the hunter even knew Fallen tongue. It was littered with notes and drawings of unknown creatures, often scaled to be of incredible size. 

"Codex," she muttered. Said ghost appeared, scanning the old book without any objection. While he was busy trying to make sense of the scrawl, Cero took to another part of the tent.

A chest was half opened, revealing some items the nightstalker had never seen before. Bottles with bright coloured fluid were lined up, dried berries rested against eachother, and a bunch of crystals were reflecting a faint purple due to Cero's facial light.

"Where the hell am I?", she asked after staring at the items for another 10 seconds, noticing only now that her helmet was broken in half, revealing her glowing eyes. She took it off and tossed it in a corner. Looking around once more, the hunter saw a mirror standing slightly tilted against a pillar and walked towards it, gazing at herself. Her purple hue was faint from exhaustion, her gear burned to reveal some of her own metal, and the spine on her right arm was cracked. Cero looked like a wreck.

"I have no idea. This writing, I've never seen anything like it," Codex answered after he noticed how quiet she became. It was true, the book was unknown to both of them.

"Any suggestions on what to do?" Cero asked. It seemed to be the middle of the night, a single moon lighting up the night sky through the opening of the tent.

"We- we should wait for sunrise. If my calculations are correct, this forest may be crawling with oversized animals. Possibly lethal. We can't engage in a fight, I don't feel any of the traveler's light here. What if you die?", Codex whispered the last part, coming closer to look at the guardian. He seemed worried, scared almost. He had a right to be. Cero was shaken up, too.

"I'm okay, look," the hunter reassured and showed him some of her void light. It shaped into the fimiliar purple bow, an arrow forming in her small right hand. "See?" She said and smiled, the light fading at her will. The exo lifted up her hand and held it in place for Codex to put himself on.

"We'll be okay, even if the traveler isn't in our reach. He's inside our hearts, and no one can take that from us," Cero said, and watched her ghost close his eye upon the soothing words.

"Alric took Deji back. He must've seen my tracker. They might be gathering a force to clear out the Vex surrounding the warp gate so they can get us back. Everything will be fine," she explained and sat down on the bed, still watching the one who gave her a second chance at life.

Taking off her cloak, she made a small nest-like bed for her ghost, close by the pillow she planned to rest on. A makeshift loading station, if you will. She carefully set him in her cape and laid down, gazing at the ghost.

"Goodnight, Codex," Cero murmured and let sleep take over her system.

-

The next morning Cero opened her eyes, seeing light entering the tent through small gaps of uneven sewing. She sat up and tried to readjust her armor. It was very uncomfortable and sticky from that goblin acid.

"Come on, Codex. Let's look around," she said and poked her ghost, the tiny guide slowly floating up until he was on eye level with her.

The hunter took her cloak again, and fastened it around her neck. She pulled up the hood, which was also partly burned, and started walking.

Their first plan was to go down. Find a river. Cero was able to live without food and water for approximately a month, so they had enough time to search for any sign of human life.

Following a path that seemed to be used quite often, they laid eyes upon a pack of.. dinosaurs?

"Uhh.. Did we timetravel?", Codex asked, his gears turning in confusion.

"Impossible. It was a warp gate. Not a time traveling device," she muttered. The big, long necked dino's were eating from a tree and seemed unbothered by their prescence.

"They're herbivores. Let's move on," Cero said and poked the stunned ghost.

Next to the occasional big dinosaur, all they encountered were overgrown bugs and weird plants. The exo started to get annoyed, kicking a pebble into a random bush and hearing a loud shriek.

"Oh, traveler save us.." Codex yelped, dreading the sound. Cero took out her sniper, not feeling compassionate to whatever would try to kill her in the coming moment.

A large, golden coloured beast revealed itself, shaking its body and exposing a bunch of needle-sharp scales. It looked like some kind of bird. The thing glared at Cero for three agonizing seconds before spreading its wings and shrieking so loud the exo had to cover her hearing system. Once it stopped, Cero regained her senses and aimed, landing a direct shot in its head. It growled once, twice, before falling down and ceasing its movement. Cero frowned and lowered her weapon slowly.

"I uh.. expected more," the exo said and walked up to the carcass. She lifted up one of its wings and took a scale, turning it over once before deciding to place it in her pouch.

"Cero. There's someone here," Codex said, his tone serious. The guardian turned around and saw a flash of bright red before it disappeared behind a tree.

"Come out. I'm a friendly," she tried. No reply.

"I don't think they speak English. I mean, the book," the black ghost muttered. Cero mouthed an 'ooh' before clearing her throat system.

"Hey!", the exo yelled and saw a puff of red appear. Cero dropped her sniper and sat down, the weapon transmatting to her inventory, trying to show the stranger that she meant no harm.

It took a while, but finally the person revealed themselves. It was a woman with bright red hair and gray eyes. She carried what looked like an oversized katana, and her gear looked like she was some royal knight.

"This is getting weirder and weirder. I don't know what loopyland we entered," Codex whispered. Cero just squinted and watched the girl approach them with caution.

She asked something, but the exo was unable to make sense out of it. She sighed and stood up, pointing at herself.

"Cero," she said firmly. Then she pointed to her ghost.

"Codex," the guardian finished. Then she pointed at the girl, who was trying to recite their names.

"A-Ara. Ara," she said and pulled at her right twintail, blushing at her slip up.

Cero smiled and rummaged through her item pouch, revealing the notebook from the camp. She closed her eyes briefly before following through with her plan. If she was staying here, she needed to know the language.

"Ara," Cero said warmly. Pointing at the book, and then at herself, she opened and closed her mouth a few times, imitating how a human would talk. The redhead gazed at her for a moment, and then grabbed the exo's hand with a bright smile.

"Guess we're gonna go back to school," the nightstalker said with a grin, and Codex just shook his tiny shell, not believing his guardian.


	4. Chapter 4

Ara was humming a tune while manouvring through the everwoods, Cero surprisingly compliant to her way of moving through the forest. The smaller person had no trouble keeping up with her ways of venturing forth. Then again, it came as no surprise, since Cero was able to kill a Seregios in a single hit. Looking back occasionally, the redhead saw her new companion play with a few bitterbugs and flutterflies, not noticing the way Ara smiled at her.

It was oddly serene, seeing an unknown being interact with the fauna in the everwoods like it was the first time seeing common bugs. Cero giggled when a blue winged flutterfly crawled on her arm, the girl carefully picking it up and placing it on a leaf.

Ara was caught staring by the small sentient spikey ball named Codex, the thing floating towards her and turning its spikes in a random order before making a high pitched noise. Cero heard this, as she quickly turned away from the bugs and pulled her half destroyed hood over her head in what looked to be embarrassment.

The taller girl held out her hand at one point when they reached a rock wall with vines, waiting for the dark painted robotic humanoid to take it. Ara squeezed it lightly before taking out a small bomb with a plateau on it from her pouch. It was a bounce bomb, and it launced hunters in the air for mounting attacks. Ara was unable to climb much with her current injuries so she had found other ways to get her expedition done. Cero frowned, trying to pull her hand away in vain when Ara lit the bomb. The redhead just grinned and stepped on the plateau, the bomb going off with a soft pop and launching them both up. Cero yelled and flailed in the air, making Ara laugh heartily, followed by Codex chuckling at the startled robot.

"So cute," she said with a smile once they landed, aware that the other wouldn't get it anyway. If Cero was able to understand Wyverian, Ara wouldn't have said that. Obviously. The purple eyed girl huffed and looked down. Embarrassed again.

Codex said something to her, and it caused the dark robot to swat her partner away blindly. Codex just laughed.

-

"Ara!" the hunter heard once she made it to the busy streets of Dundorma. she looked around and caught a glimpse of a Dragonseal, the sword so big it stood out above every commoner.

"Scar! I thought you were in Harth," the tall girl said with a smile, recognizing the hunter instantly. the male shook his head, holding up a bag with Wyporium items once he got close enough to talk to her.

"ofcourse, you experimental nerd," the girl said and punched his shoulder playfully.

"Gotta have some hobby, right?" he grinned and stuffed the satchel back around his belt. "how are you feeling?"

Ara gazed at him for a moment and shrugged, not really feeling like telling everything that was bothering her.

"I'm here if you need me, okay? I'll be staying at the inn for about a week until I start hunting for a new armor set. you know the drill," he explained and pat Ara's head, who in turn giggled and twirled one of her red strands in a shy habit. Scar was incredibly well known in Dundorma. He had made a name for himself after fending off several elder dragons who were trying to destroy the walls. one of those hunts, Ara was involved in. It was roughly three years back, when she was just done doing a harvest tour in the Dunes. She returned to the city, and was shocked to see the plaza littered with oil and tar, some of which on fire. it was like a safety hazard.

Ara ended up in an urgent hunt with a random bunch of G ranks, one of those was Scar. He seemed prepared for the battle while the redhead was scared out of her wits. What they were facing was larger than anything she'd encountered on her travels. A Gogmazios, going berserk and close to destroying the ancient city.

They managed to kill it after a suffocating 40 minutes, and to Ara's surprise, Scar came walking up to her after carving materials. He asked her name, and told her he wanted to hunt sometime, when it was just them.

"Tell me how it goes, maybe I can join for extra help," the grey eyed girl said with a smile and Scar nodded, waving his hand and disappearing back into the crowd.

Speaking of help..

Where did Cero go?

Ara panicked and frantically searched for the small girl, cursing at herself for her incompetence. She made her way into the busy part of the market, and yelled out Cero's name. what if she got lost? Dundorma was big. Bigger than the famous Port Tanzia, and it was easy to lose your way in the narrow streets.

"Excuse me, have you seen a hooded stranger with worn gear somewhere?" Ara asked an elderly woman, who shook her head and told her to try the plaza. There was currently a parade going on, maybe the tiny robot was there.


	5. Chapter 5

Colours were everywhere. Confetti was thrown by civilians and Cero clapped along to the music being played. It was amazing, seeing a parade up close. Dancing women with silk dresses were gracefully moving forward, synchronized and precise. A big cart with pink and yellow fabric around it was moving along the path, being pushed by a giant bird-like creature.

"I've only ever seen things like this on videos from before the fall," Cero yelled to her ghost over the music and cheers. Codex made a sound of agreement in the signature distortion he carried with his voice. Back in the tower nothing like this had ever occured. People were too busy mourning lost friends and fighting against the enemy.

Somehow, the entire solar system Cero knew seemed dull in comparison to the happiness of these people. The nightstalker stopped clapping, realizing her reality. If she ever were to go back, her life would return to death and decay. Days and days of the same fight. After all, Codex had revived her with the sole purpose to kill for an already ruined world.

She looked down at her armor. It was ruined, her gauntlet holding on for dear life and her pants ripped. Next to that, some of the leather was just gone and exposing the purple marks on her chest and legs.

Cero sighed, turning away from the commotion and making her way back to where she last saw Ara.

It didn't take long to spot the redhead as she ran up to the guardian with a panicked face, and before Cero could register what was happening, Ara was hugging her.

A human was hugging her cold, metal body.

Cero pushed the other back quickly, turning her head and refusing to meet Ara's eyes. The physical contact made the guardian remember what she was. Why she hated herself.

She was an Exo. She didn't have skin. She didn't have a heart like humans did. The only thing she ever desired upon her rebirth was to feel a heartbeat inside her chest, and she could never have one. Not even if she killed the the Fallen, Cabal, Vex and Hive. Not even if she repelled the darkness from the entire universe.

"Cero," Codex said with a worried tone, but said hunter remained quiet, balling her hands into fists and ruining the already worn leather from her gloves even further.

Cero hated the fact she was a mechanical thing with the curse of being able to think just like a human. Act like one. Feel like one, yet she wasn't. All she knew is that some people hated her guts, just for existing. Some clans specifically didn't allow Exo guardians to join, stating that they didn't need mindless machines on their team. It was painful. She met Alric, sure, but the white haired awoken expressed many times how he found it 'fascinating' the way Cero functioned. Like she was something to be studied. Only Deji really knew how she felt about herself. He also expressed his discomfort around humans, as some of them made him feel like he wasn't alive and just a tool to kill.

"Cero," this time her name was called by Ara. The petite hunter looked up, her mouth plates grinding against eachother in frustration. Ara came closer once more, and the other stepped back out of reflex. Touch made her remember. Touch wasn't good.

"It's okay," she said with a heavy accent.

The exo's eyes lit up, expressing shock. Did Ara just speak English?

The tall girl smiled softly, pointing at Codex. He had taught her the phrase while the guardian was busy loathing herself.

Oh.

"You're such a sap," Cero muttered at her ghost after a moment and scratched her neck.

Realizing how useless her hate towards herself was for others around her, the guardian pushed her thoughts to the back of her head like always, and took a deep breath.

She was fine.

-

Cero watched as Ara conversed with a cart driver, the vehicle drawn by two dopey looking dino's. They were eating some hay while calmly waiting for a command, and the nightstalker saw Ara hand the man a satchel with presumably money in it. The redhead beckoned Cero and stepped onto the cart. The guardian followed suit and sighed in relief when she was finally allowed to sit back and relax for a moment.

All the new things had drained her energy, and Codex seemed to share her thoughts as the ghost instantly placed himself on Cero's left hand. He went into charge mode, and left the guardian to brood about her current situation.

She needed a way to get her comms back to life, so she could reach Zavala and tell him what happened to her. It was likely that she wasn't even in her own solar system, so it was going to be hard.

Really hard.

Sighing, she lifted up her hand and gazed at the small ghost. His shell was partly damaged during the landing they made at the basecamp, and it was kind of dirty. Then again, Cero was too. They both were in dire need of a shower.

"You can guide me back, can't you?" Cero asked softly to her ghost. She'd need to build some kind of radio device. Codex could help her. He always did.

Placing her hand on her lap, she turned her head to see the outskirts of the city they were leaving. The guardian guessed it was only a pit stop so Ara could hire this dino cart and spare them both from walking to wherever they were headed.

Looking at the redhead, Cero saw the tall girl had taken off her giant sword from her back. It had always seemed interesting, but a good looked revealed that it showed a pattern which resembled a layer of ice on the sheath.

Ara drew the sword without a warning, and Cero gasped.

It looked stunning yet deadly. Like one touch of the blade could instantly freeze your entire body. Ara didn't notice the nightstalkers interest, and she pulled out a neat shaped stone. She blew on it a bit before placing it on the weapon, and as if she'd done it thousands of times, started sharpening the edge.

It looked like ara was holding a blade that had traces of liquid nitrogen on it. The air around the sword so cold the oxygen around it was clearly visible. It was mesmerizing how the redhead cared for it, the smile on her honey skinned face not going unnoticed.

Cero had a hint of a smile on her face as well, and allowed her eyes to close. Listening to the repeated sound of the whetstone against the metal, she drifted into a dreamless sleep.


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The song Cero is singing  
> https://youtu.be/yWcGtLblBxs

Cero stirred awake. She opened her eyes and saw that she was laying in a bed with a red, woolen blanket. She sat up slowly, and looked around. Since it was dark, the guardian had to activate her night vision, and when she did she noticed how hoarded the place was. Big weapons were clumsily placed next to eachother, and all kinds of bottles and items were scattered around. Random armor pieces were stuffed in another chest, some more worn than others.

Was this Ara's room?

Cero lifted her legs out of the bed, and she only now realized that her gear was gone. It was replaced with silk nightwear in a soft, blue color. The shade reminded her of when she first started as a guardian. The loot just wouldn't stop being blue, and she bought one of Amanda's air brush sets so she could paint her weapons.

The guardian peered around for Codex, and found the ghost idling on a nightstand, gazing straight at her.

"Damn, that's creepy. Don't do that," Cero said with a chuckle and Codex started floating towards her.

"I expected you to freak out. You know, with Ara changing you while you were asleep," he stated, and turned on his flashlight so Ara could use normal sight.

"Normally I would, but if I had worn that outfit any longer it would've started to eat away at me. Some of my shade is probably already gone," she said, standing up and looking at one of the swords.

"Ara was very reluctant, but did it anyway. She asked me before she tried anything, though. The girl seems worried about you, Cero. It's quite interesting," the ghost flew around her and his guardian tilted her head.

"I mean, I am pretty hopeless at the moment," the nightstalker confessed, laughing a bit.

"You always are."

"Hey, rude.."

"Yes, that's my nickname, Cero. You established that three years ago."

The small girl sat down on the bed again, giggling at the conversation. Her ghost's sassiness was honestly entertaining. He even one upped Zavala back in the day when the titan was particularly fed up with rookies failing lunar missions. After Cero had mapped out the entire Hellmouth in detail, Zavala told her he had already acquired that map with more force in his voice than needed. He was frustrated, and he was allowed to feel emotions, but Codex wasn't having it and compared the maps, blueprints showing slight differences with floor levels while telling the commander that the mission took his guardian 15 days entire days. Also, Cero's map was way more up to date with the data the vanguard titan already had. Zavala ended up giving her an apartment upgrade as a way of apologizing, and he's been double checking his sources ever since.

"Ara will come back tomorrow. She tried to.. tell me.. or something, that she would be gone for the night. You were out for 6 hours but I wouldn't fault you if you just slept until sunrise," Codex said. Cero gave a nod and crawled back in the comfy bed, covering herself with the blanket.

"I'm kinda glad Ara found us. I don't know where I would be without her help," the purple eyed exo murmured once she buried her head in the pillow. It smelled a bit like honey, like Ara, and Cero wondered what she was doing at the moment. Maybe talking to her friends, sleeping somewhere else or exploring another place. The tall woman was a mystery, and Cero couldn't wait to learn more about her.

-

"I can't sleep," Cero muttered an hour later. Her ghost made a high pitched sound as if to show that he heard his guardian. The nightstalker sat up, blanket sliding off a bit from her body.

"I just keep thinking. About Venus and Parallax. Those two are probably fighting because of me. I wish I could at least tell them I'm okay," she sighed, picking at a lose thread on her payama's.

"I'll try and figure something out, Cero. Right now you need to focus on the language in order to find clues about a possible Vex gate. It will be fine. You said so yourself," Codex stated, and the guardian smiled at her ghost. He was always there for her, always ready to help.

"Thanks. I think I'm going to sort out this mess to distract myself," the guardian said and nodded towards all the scattered things piled up around the room.

"Do what you must. I will start on the tracker," he replied and they both moved, beginning their own tasks.

While Codex was neck deep in numbers and screens, Cero cleaned up the redwood chest. It was literally hoarded with supplies. Berries, bottles with odd liquids and.. bones?

She picked one up, comparing it to her own arm.

"The hell is she doing with all this crap?" The guardian muttered. Most of it looked like it hadn't been used in months.

"The same as you with old weapons. Don't toss anything out," the ghost said back, currently filling Ara's entire bed with holopads and random code.

"Alright, nerd," Cero shrugged and started to take out all the junk. The guardian sorted everything by colour, trying to make it fit in the chest. Dust covered items were put at the bottom after being wiped clean, while recently used things were placed higher up. She began humming a tune to fill the silence, and Codex responded with playing the actual mp3 file of the song. It was from just before the Golden Age. She enjoyed the soft melody, singing along with the woman in the song.

*Oh today I'm just a drop of water*  
*And I'm running down a mountainside*  
*Come tomorrow I'll be in the ocean*  
*I'll be rising with the morning tide*

"Come on, Dex," she said with a smile, holding out her hand. Codex floated over to her, placing himself on her palm and watching the world starting to spin slowly. Cero was turning around in circles, her voice filling the caravan.

*There's a ghost upon the moor tonight*  
*Now it's in our house*  
*When you walked into the room just then*  
*It's like the sun came out*

Her ghost hadn't heard her sing in almost half a year. The small exo only sang when she was feeling comfortable, and she hasn't been for a long, long time. It was like Ara's world had given the guardian hope again, even after the panick attack she suffered in that big city.

*I'm an atom in a sea of nothing*  
*Looking for another to combine*  
*Maybe we could be the start of something*  
*Be together at the start of time*

Cero stopped spinning, letting her ghost fly around her. These small moments were like gold in a pool of mud and stones. The guardian almost never gave herself a break, and it showed. She had almost forgotten what it felt like to just sing and let herself move to the music.

*And the day is clear*  
*My voice is just a whisper*  
*Louder than the screams you hear*  
*It's like the sun came out*

The song finished, and Cero took a deep breath. The girl proceeded to sit down again and continue her cleaning as if nothing happened.

"You should sing more often," Codex suggested after a minute of silence, his voice gentle. The guardian shrugged as she held up some kind of gray gem.

"Who has time to sing when Cabal are on our doorstep? When Vex try to sabotage time and space? I can't just do that. I'll lose sight of what's important," Cero explained, and poked some kind of squishy sponge she found in the mess.

"The traveler is important, but so are you," her ghost said, sounds of discomfort escaping his tiny shell.

"I'll think about it."


	7. Chapter 7

Returning to Dundorma suddenly felt way worse than it ever had. Well, except that one time where smoke was seen from more than 5 steppes away. Harth folk said a giant monster had awoken to lay chaos upon everything, but as long as it concerned hunters, that wasn't the plan. Gogmazios was slain, and Ara had finally had a real taste of the horrors the world.

That aside, something far worse has now popped up in the woods. The machine which was able to harm even a veteran to the point where she had to run for it, that was slightly concerning.

"Don't worry, boss. Maybe Cero can help us. She appeared around the same time, right? Same spot, too. Maybe she's connected to it," Fluffy speculated. He was right, and that's why Ara took it upon herself to guide the robot back to Val Habar. Cero was not an enemy. Maybe she was here to warn the guild.

Maybe that's why she needed to learn Wyverian in such a hurry.

Approaching the gates, one of the guards lowered the bridge and allowed her to traverse inside the busy streets. It was night, and the festival had calmed down, settling for a nice ambience with late night civilians hanging out at pubs, faint music being played just loud enough for the redhead to hear. She headed towards the elder hall with little effort, knowing the maze of streets like her favourite armor.

Fluffy followed along the rooftops, and finally jumped on the big stairs that led to the beautiful elder hall.

"State your business. Quests are on stand-by because of the yearly Kut-Ku festival," a lance wielding guard said and didn't waste a moment to block Ara from traversing any further.

"I need to speak with His Immenseness. I am Ara, crowned hunter of the Capital C. It's urgent," she said, standing straight with a stern look on her honey toned face. Her relic gear certainly proved her words, and made the guard nod his head once, stepping aside and granting permission to continue.

The elder hall was dimly lit with festival lanterns, and the unmistakable giant at the end of the tarp sitting on his massive chair raised a brow at visitors this late.

"What brings you here, fine hunter and felyne?" His Imenseness asked, and the redhead pursed her lips.

"An unknown monster has surfaced in the everwoods and.. caused significant, long lasting damage to my dominant arm and abdomen. Hunter wounds heal fast, but these have been persisting for an alarming time. My health based palico is unsure of what causes it. Regarding the monster, it wields a weapon far more advanced than anything in our lands and uses bait to lure people inside a trap for whatever purpose. Please issue an alert for everyone," Ara explained, holding up her arm and removing her bandage, revealing her severely burned arm which was covered in blisters almost as red as her hair.

"My boss is unable to hunt. We need to deploy a research team to gain smarts about that thing!" Fluffy added, raising his paws in the air. The man made a low hum.

"Ara, correct? I see you are worried about the folk, but the Everwoods are alive. I'm sure it will keep out this thing until you are healed enough to face it," His Immenseness assured. Ara looked down, lowering her arm.

"The thing took a child inside a closed caravan in Val Habar without causing damage to the property, and it was as tall as a proud Teostra. If I was tailing it, we would've seen it for I am a professional tracker. It didn't just travel. It teleported. Who knows how much hunters it killed already? The environment it disturbed? Please listen to me when I say this!" The girl raised her voice, effectively waking up every sleeping poogie in the hall and causing the large man to sigh.

"If that is indeed true, then I will take measure. Thank you for your warning, Ara. The guild will keep you updated," His Immenseness replied, and hit the ground with his sheathed sword, causing the gong behind him to emit a deafening sound.

Ara left the hall in one swift turn and felt Fluffy's paw on her leg briefly, possibly trying to calm the riled up hunter down.

"It's slow. It didn't move at the speed of a Rajang when it chased me. That man's caravan was fine. It just appeared and disappeared," the redhead thought out loud. Fluffy kept quiet, allowing his boss to crank her brain.

"I think we should tell Cero," Fluffy admitted. It seemed like the best idea. Cero was every bit as mysterious as that machine. Maybe she knew about it. That tiny girl didn't kill a healthy adult Seregios with a lucky shot.

"Let's go back. I'm exhausted," Ara said, picking up her felyne friend and hugging him, receiving a soft purr in return from the palico. Her head was pounding and her chest hurt.

-

Finally arriving back, she silently opened her caravan door and the first thing she noticed was Cero. The girl was on the floor, curled up and holding Ara's Zinogre mask. She had fallen asleep, and Codex Perked up at the redhead's arrival.

"What's all this?" She asked more to herself than to the two guests. The tall hunter looked around and noticed how her cluttered space was significantly more organized, and her dreadful supply chest had been tidied so much that it was able to close again.

Codex floated towards her, pressing himself briefly at the redheads cheek as if to give her a hug, and the blademaster giggled.

"Hello Codex. Look at this," she whispered, holding up her index finger to her mouth and quietly approaching the sleeping robot. Codex kept perfectly still in the air, and Ara kneeled down at the slumbering girl. She took out a glass phial containing a Flutterfly she found on her way back, the wings just as purple as Cero's eyes.

"Cero," she said softly, and placed her slender hand on the petite robot's cheeks. Ara heard a sudden sound that was a little like the steam engines in Harth, but way softer and quieter. Ara saw those purple eyes light up to look at the redhead.

"Hi," the tall girl smiled and received a gasp in return. Cero scrambled back a little, holding onto Ara's mask like it was some kind of comfort teddy, close to her chest. The redhead chuckled and held up the bottle, pointing to her own eyes, then to Cero.

"Purple," the blademaster said clearly. The robot looked with raised brow plates for a second before relaxing and smiling too.

"Purple," she repeated with a slight accent. Ara's face lit up, and she nodded excitedly.

"Yes! Purple!" She said and held the bottle for Cero to take. The tiny girl accepted the Flutterfly, looking at the cute bug the same way she did in the Everwoods.

Ara wanted to tell her about the machine. But.. not right now. She was done dealing with responsibilities for the next few hours, thinking those exact words as she started taking off her heavy armor. Storge was great, but it was constricting at times.

Removing her chest piece together with her cape, she sighed and felt like she could finally breathe again after an entire day. The redhead changed into some simple clothes and stored her set in her magnificently cleaned supply box.

Ara stretched her sore body and decided to finally reward herself with the rest she needed. She relaxed as her head finally hit the pillow, and she smelled the slightly metallic scent of Cero. The redhead was out in seconds.


	8. Chapter 8

It was the evening after Ara had returned, and the redhead was still dreaming away. She ko'd the moment she touched the sheets, so Cero had to use a blanket she found from Ara's closet to cover the girl against bugs for the day. They were at an oasis, after all.

Cero had spent the time trying to make her comms work, and it proved to be even harder than she and her ghost had thought.

No matter what they tried, it didn't work. At one point they received jumbled radiowaves, even some old music, but it returned to static soon after. What didn't make sense were the coördinates, though. Normally it would say roughly how many years you'd be away from the receiver without a warp drive, but on the counter it showed a bunch of random negative numbers. Cero was pretty sure it broke upon impact or something. It just didn't make sense.

The exo emitted a frustrated sigh, tempted to just chuck the damn thing out of the window. It was bad that she didn't know where she actually was in the universe, but the fact she couldn't even report back was like salt on a wound. Human expression.

"Oh," the guardian heard from her left and saw the redhead was sleepily gazing at her. Her hair was a mess, and her fringe was covering her forehead. Next to that, her shirt was kind of exposing her entire right shoulder, causing the nightstalker to have trouble focusing on Ara's face instead of her.. well, anyway.

"Hello," Cero said in Wyverian, something she'd learned by listening to people outside greeting eachother. She decided to stop tinkering with her tracker in favour of "talking" to the tall, drowsy girl. She looked like some kind of golden age model, effortlessly beautiful.

Ara muttered something, not realizing Cero wasn't going to understand her, and squinted her eyes at the window. The guardian sat on the bed, barely dipping the mattress, and fidgeted with some thread on the blanket.

Without any warning, the redhead yawned and grabbed Cero's arm, pulling her into a lazy hug while saying something unknown and leaning back against the bedpost.

What.

Cero gazed wide-eyed at the tall girl, who was falling asleep again. Oh great. Next to her thoughts racing a mile a minute, now Cero was so close to Ara she could hear her heart beat.

It was calming, though, and steady. Unlike the whirr in her own body to keep her core from overheating. She placed her head carefully against Ara's chest after a moment, listening to her heart. She counted the times. One, two, three.. Cero didn't see when Codex hovered over them, capturing a sneaky photo and returning to try to fix the comm while the two girls slept peacefully.

-

Cero woke up to an empty bed at sunrise. She sat up, looking around the caravan space and seeing Ara was gone together with her giant sword. Somehow, Cero felt a little disappointed, especially how she had put herself in a vulnerable position towards the tall beauty last night. If she was a human, she'd most definetly have blushed at the memory.

"Codex, status report," she said, shaking the thoughts from her thinker and standing up from the messy bed. Codex flew in front of the guardian, and started his daily routine like he always did.

"Planet coördinates still unknown. Current position Val Habar. The woman called Ara seems to know a lot about the woods you warped to, and carries around a weapon 3 times the weight of an average Fallen Captain. How she swings it is beyond my calculations," he said, showing a small blueprint hologram of the blade, some scientific jumbles and then a fat question mark at the end of it. Cero chuckled. "I am unable to establish a good link between the tower and here. The internal drive of your tracker remains undamaged, but I don't know what's wrong with it to show negative numbers," Codex finished, and the guardian gave a curt nod.

"Current objective?" She asked, putting on a full coverage cloak she found eating dust in that supply box. She looked shady but at least she wouldn't scare people that way.

"Anything goes. We just need to know more about where we are and how these people live. If we're going to be stuck here for a while it would be best to be aware of their culture," the ghost concluded and hovered above Cero's head, waiting for the hunter to make a move.

"Guess we'll go shopping then," she shrugged and left the caravan, eager to figure out this new world.


	9. Chapter 9

Cero wondered why Ara left. Then again, she was also gone for a pretty long time yesterday, so maybe she had some kind of job? Who knows. 

It was already dusk, and Cero had spent her day observing people, buying things and shocking merchants with her currency. They babbled some Wyverian, holding the pouch of glimmer Cero deemed an agreeable trade in their worn hands and whipped out a magnifying glass. All three of them. One of them plopped an extra spiky, tough skinned fruit in her order, presumably because he thought the glimmer was a precious thing. She felt bad, but then again, glimmer was pretty hard to find in places the Traveler hadn't colonized.

Codex had been oddly quiet, staying in the crook of her neck just out of sight from people. Maybe the ghost was taken aback by the peace in here. The lack of military terms, war zones, weaponry and.. well, guardians. Everyone was mortal here. One life to live, and the people looked incredibly happy.

"Feels like Mars just slapped me in the face," she huffed and pried a particularly annoying grain of sand out of her neck wires when she stepped inside Ara's cozy caravan. The place outside was pretty easy to move around in, but the winds were a big pet peeve. She set down her bags and took off the massive cloak and too big boots she borrowed from the redhead, happy that she was able to cover her unusual appearance in this scattered town. Or.. gathering. It was basically just a big caravan party.

"At least Val Habar doesn't have storms that reach up to 100 kilometers an hour," Codex perked up from behind her after his quiet episode and she rolled her eyes.

"Smart-ass."

"Your smart-ass," the ghost said and hovered closer to her.

"Glad you're with me," she chuckled and rummaged through the items she bought, revealing a few clothes she could use for the time being. Assuming she was going to stay here for a while.

Would Ara let her?

Pushing the thought back in the back of her thinker immediately, she sat down on the bed, gazing at the soft fabric. It reminded her of the tower, and Alric. The titan always wore these extremely comfy sweaters off duty and Cero admitted to sometimes stealing one, using it as her many substitute pajama's.

She missed the Tower. Missed Alric and Deji, the way they always bickered but gazed fondly at eachother's back when one wasn't looking. The moments she shared with Banshee, his lectures about the best way to care for her guns in that slow drawl of his, and how Cayde and Zavala always made sure she was on time for briefing, knowing that Cero usually added an extra night patrol in her schedule in favour of ditching sleep.

"Cero, are you okay? I sense fluctuations in your mental stabili-"

"Fine. I'm fine," the guardian muttered, putting the soft blue shirt back in the bag and taking one of Ara's books to admire instead of talking about feelings with her ghost as she laid down on the red sheets, smelling the faint scent of the girl who brought her to a safe place in this strange world.

-

A loud bang woke Cero up from her unplanned nap and she quickly removed the book from her face, laying her purple eyes on a figure standing in the doorway. The person was panting hard and grasping onto the doorway for support, a trickle of dark red spilling onto the wooden planks of the caravan. It took her a second, not able to see who was standing in the doorway like a shadow.

And then she saw the twintails.

Did Ara get mauled by a fucking Warbeast?

The redhead's right shoulder looked like a horror movie prop. Her normally beautiful honey toned skin was holding on for dear life, exposing the fat tissue under it while covered in blood mixed with some kind of clear substance. Most likely saliva from the creature that tried to maul her damn shoulder.

"Codex.. I'm gonna need your help," Cero whispered, and the ghost instantly made his way to the wounded girl, the guardian following and grabbing the girl as fast as she could to offer support. Ara smelled like blood, the unmistakable scent filling Cero's system.

The redhead stumbled forward, fell onto her knees and followed Codex's movement in a haze before she lost her counciousness, her body falling against Cero. This was bad. Really bad-

"Do something!" The nightstalker yelled and saw her ghost desperately shining his blue light over the bleeding wound.

"Carry her to the bed. You need to stitch her up, I can't do anything major since she's not from the light," the tiny AI said, turning to face the nightstalker and frantically twisting his shell in distress. Cero wasted no time and lifted Ara up, silently thanking her exo strength as she made her way to the bed, making sure not to worsen her condition.

"It's gonna be okay.. what in the name of Osiris have you done," Cero said, unable to steady her voice, and saw Codex had transmatted stitching supplies while emitting a stressed sound from his shell.

This was gonna suck.

-

Cero never appreciated her steady hands more. Cero had only once stitched up another human. A guardian girl with a dead ghost. Her arm had been torn apart by a fallen captain and it took everything for Codex to heal the woman. It didn't work. She passed away during the process due to blood loss. Cero looked down at Ara, who was now sleeping. Codex was able to heal her, but he couldn't fully restore everything since Ara wasn't a guardian, and Codex had no direct connection with the Traveler.

It just showed how far they were from home.

Next to the massive flesh wound which was now reduced to bruising and scratches, there was also something more worrying adorning her body upon a more thorough examination.

Darkness.

Ara had been infected with the Darkness, just like Eris Morn had been back in the tragic Hellmouth raid. While it had consumed the former guardian up to the point where she, according to many, lost her mind and humanity, for Ara, Cero was quick to remove the infection from the girl's body. It hadn't seeped into her vital organs for some godly reason, so all it took was a Hive orb and a few ritual words to get rid of it entirely. Morn had written about ways to heal someone from the curse, and Ikora Rey had issued every single guardian to read up on it, including Exo guardians. If Cero'd ever see Ikora again, she would tell her about the way she indirectly saved a mortal life.

It confused the hunter, though. How had Ara been infected with the Darkness while the Traveler hadn't been on this world yet? It didn't make sense.

Unless the Vex were plotting with Hive.

For now, she just needed to learn the god damned language so she could actually tell the redhead what happened, and what was about to happen.

The guardian was sitting on the floor next to Ara's bed, her chin on the matress, gazing at the taller girl. Several hours had passed since the whole ordeal, but it was still extremely unsettling to see the normally happy and bubbly redhead in a state so awful. It reminded her of when Deji had taken a bullet right in his head to protect Alric. That was what ended up in the grumpy warlock having to make due with Vex eyes. Alric had programmed them in after killing the units that shot at them in the first place. Since Cero was stealthing, pinpointing enemy locations and taking down Vex, she watched the horrific event happen from a distance. It was a miracle Deji wasn't hit in his thinker, or he'd have been Deji-9 instead of 8 by now. The entire scene was like their souls had switched. Deji protecting Alric, using his body as a shield, and Alric staining his hands with blood to salvage his friend's eyesight.

Shrugging off the unsettling memory, she looked at Codex for a second, wondering why he had been so quiet.

"Cat's got your tongue again? What's with you since we arrived in this world?"

The ghost twirled a bit, floating closer to his guardian and.. staying silent. A while ago, the tiny ghost had guided her through the entire process of saving Ara, but he stopped talking immediately when the redhead was out of danger and only slightly injured.

"Do I gotta start interrogati-"

"Uploading data," he muttered suddenly, in a monotone voice, and Cero noticed how Codex in his silence had casually hacked into her thinker.

"You sly little.." she said and frowned, wondering what he was going to copy over to her system.

"Upload complete," the ghost finished, and floated back to where he was before.

"What was that about?" She asked, and found herself tense at the sound of Ara moving beneath the blanket. She looked over at the girl and saw those gray eyes gaze right back at her.

"Cero," Ara said with a sheepish smile before wincing and grabbing her shoulder.

"Woah woah, calm down, don't touch that," the guardian said in a soft voice and grabbed her hand, placing it on her stomach instead.

"C-Cero..?" Ara muttered, dumbfounded.

"Yes?" She responded with a chuckle before noticing that the redhead's eyes got even wider at her answer.

"You speak Wyverian!" She yelled and winced again, willing herself to calm down.

"Huh. I guess I also understand it," Cero confirmed, and squinted her eyes at Codex before grinning, the ghost innocently twirling around.

"Codex might've.. 'explained' it to me," she shrugged and Ara's mouth opened at the fluidity in Cero's speech.

"He just told you everything while I was gone?" The redhead asked, knitting her brows together in confusion.

"It's complicated. More importantly, what tried to eat you?" Cero asked, pointing at the red, stitched up wound. Ara looked down at herself and sighed, scratching her head with her left hand.

"It was a Nargacuga. The beast had been terrorizing small towns up north and I'd been called in to take it out. Turned out it was Apex," the girl raised and sat up against the bedpost with a slight grimace and avoided eyecontact with the nightstalker. "Basically, Apex means that it's gone berserk with some kind of frenzy and tries to kill everything it comes across, including it's own species. I killed it, but as I stabbed through with my blade, it bit my shoulder and ripped open my skin before giving up. I made my way back without making my prescence known because my Palico is a medical wonder, so I thought he'd fix me up once I went back to my caravan. Instead it was you who I freaked out," she finally gazed at Cero, who had both of her brow plates raised in question.

"You went all the way to Val Habar with a wound like that?" The exo asked in disbelief, jabbing the air just above Ara's right shoulder with her index finger.

"Yes, but, now that we can communicate, I think there's other stuff we need to discuss besides my.. well-being," she frowned and turned her head to Codex, who was smugly watching the two, happy with his handiwork.

"Who are you, Cero?" Ara simply asked, and the hunter closed her eyes, bracing herself for the shitstorm she was about to lay down on the redhead's table. Taking a deep breath, she beckoned Codex, asking him to give her some files on her fimiliar worlds.

"Alright, okay... I.. I am Cero-0. I am what people call a guardian, and I fight against extraterrestrial enemies who want to destroy my solar system. We have been graced with what some may call a "God"," Cero stated, Codex helpfully showing a holoscreen image of the Traveler, ever asleep, watching above the last city.

"Some 700 years ago, the Traveler came to our solar system to colonize it entirely," the exo explained, pulling up a video of the first manned Mars mission, where humans found the Traveler, colonizing the sandly planet.

"This thing, God, alien, whatever you may call it, made our worlds prosper. we had everything we wanted," she said, pausing her finger on one tiny, particularly black image next to the video playing.

"Until we didn't," the hunter continued, pressing on the photo that showed the gigantic Phantom ship closing in on the Traveler. It was eerie. Like the first time Cero ever encountered Hive, it gave her the heebie jeebies just looking at it.

"The Darkness, for lack of a better name, has a goal that can affect you too. Your world. Your people," she zoomed in on the image.

"This thing killed almost everything in our solar system. It ruined the colonies on Mars, Venus, Io, Titan, everything. Reduced the Traveler's work to minus two. All because it wants to reduce our universe to its simplest form," Cero spat, showing photos of skeletons and human bodies littered on one of the car graveyards in the EDZ. She heard Ara gasp, but made no effort to stop her story.

"In a last ditch plan, the Traveler sacrificed itself and sent out thousands of intelligent machines known as Ghosts," Codex twirled his shell at his mention, and continued the story.

"Cero was dead when I found her on a beach. Because I am part of the Traveler, I was able to resurrect her with the Traveler's light and inform her of her purpose. To fight. To reclaim, to become a guardian. I am her guide," he said, pride clear in his tone.

"I was on a mission with my fireteam against our enemy, the Vex, when they opened a.. portal, to your world," Cero took over again, showing a photo of a Goblin Vex. She failed to notice how Ara tensed up at the picture.

"I have no way of contact with my people and I'm stuck here, possibly billions of miles away from my home," she finished, closing the holoscreen and gazing at Ara, who was staring wide eyed at the guardian.

"So.. let me get this straight," the redhead started, frowning slightly, "You are a spacetraveling undead soldier that fights against aliens who want to destroy the universe? And they trapped you on my planet?" She asked.

Cero nodded.

"Explains what the hell that cavemonster is, then," she shrugged and relaxed a little.

"Wait, you believe me?!" The guardian stood up, bumping her head into her ghost who was just as surprised as Cero. Ara just smiled.

"And hold on, cave monster?" The exo continued, squinting suspiciously at the bedridden girl.

"Theres a giant robot monster that kidnaps babies and lures hunters into traps. I got this weird bruise from it that won't leave," Ara explained, pushing down the soft blanket and looking down at herself before her eyes grew wide in shock once more.

"Oh, that. Yeah that's kind of the darkness thing I was talking about. You were infected by it," Cero put the blanket back, scared that Ara might catch a cold somehow.

They both looked at eachother for a long moment, until Ara sighed.

"You sound like some sort of children's story gone crazy," she smiled a bit, and took Cero's metal hand.

"I know, I wish it wasn't real. I need to get rid of that Vex you mentioned. If it stays here, it can claim your planet too," Cero explained and allowed the redhead to idly fidget with one of her rusted finger plates.

"You need me as a way to get there. It's in an everchanging forest," the tall girl said, intertwining their fingers.

"Then let's get you back on the rails as fast as possible," Cero responded and squeezed Ara's hand.


	10. Chapter 10

If someone told Deji that Alric was standing at his door in the middle of the night with his ghost explaining that the awoken had been suffering from severe nightmares of Birdie dying before his eyes, thus didn't want to be alone and went to *Deji* for a solution..

He would've slapped that person. Hard.

"Is this a joke, 'Ric?" He asked, and Alric merely shook his head, avoiding eyecontact. The titan was wearing a simple black tank top and some jogging pants, and Deji couldn't find it in himself to send the guy back to deal with his dreams alone. He, just like any other exo, knew how bad the nightmares could get.

"Fuck, fine. Whatever. You can sleep in my bed, I'm staying up anyway," the warlock said, shrugging and walking back to his weapon room. He'd been modifying his pulse rifle before Alric's uncertain knock filled the apartment, breaking his concentration.

"Are you sure?" he heard the awoken ask. It was very out of character for the blonde to be so uncertain, and with the whole Birdie being MIA thing, he didn't know how much unusual things he could handle anymore. Deji usually dealt with things bluntly. Shoot it, or tell it to get lost. Birdie and Alric's issues fit none of his solitions.

"Get to bed before I throw my screwdriver at you and make my carpet your mattress for the night. C'mon," Deji said and jerked his head towards the direction of his bedroom, where Alric slowly shuffled to.

"Thanks," the tall guardian smiled slightly, his eyes for the first time in a long, frustrating time looking alive.

"Yeah. Keep the door open so I can wake you up if you have another one," he responded, and went back to the room he used to resume what he was doing, leaving his own door open too.

-

Morning came with Deji squinting at the sunlight peering through his apartment blinds, and he checked his tracker to see that it was already close to briefing time. 8 am. He sighed and stood up, hearing his springs make some noise from suddenly moving again after sitting all night. He cleaned up his workbench a bit, and tried to silently walk towards his dark bedroom after making sure all his items were in place, where a heap of blankets was obscuring the exo a view of his teammate.

Deji came closer, finding a few locks of white hair sticking out from above the fabric, and he carefully (why? Why was he careful? This was Alric. Alric always argued with him over trivial shit like who gets to eat Birdie's pudding.) lifted the wine coloured blankets.

Alric stirred, his face contorting into a slight pout as he opened his eyes. Deji huffed and dropped the fabric again, not ready to deal with that yet.

He watched as the awoken stretched his body, slender hands peeking out and balling into fists at the somewhat involuntary movement. Was it creepy to stare at your teammate waking up? Only the Traveler would know, and he wasn't about to ask.

"'Morning,", he drawled in his static voice and Alric sat up slowly, yawning as Deji's blanket slid off his upper body.

Oh.

Alric had gotten rid of his shirt sometime at night.

Wondering why the hell the universe hated him, he couldn't control his eyes and eyed Alric's exposed skin for just a second.

No scars. No marks. Just Alric. Alric who looked like a golden age perfume commercial right inside his dingy sheets.

Guy seemed too perfect to be a titan, and he shook his head to will himself to look away, all the while Alric was still trying to wake up.

"Hey," he said, voice hoarse from sleep. Oh for fucks sake.

"I'll uh.. breakー breakfast," he pointed a thumb to his kitchen a turned around on his heels. real smooth, Dej, real smooth.

He hightailed it out of his bedroom, scrambling for cereal and milk and tried not to think about Alric and his stupid muscles literally occupying his bed. *His* bed. It seemed so weird. Normally Deji wouldn't bat an eye to the awoken. But then again, the pale guardian always looked like a tin man rip-off. He'd only once seen him without his armor, and that was back when they were having a poker night after they defeated Omnigul. Deji had been trying to win from Birdie, since his glimmer was on the line. He'd had no time to gawk at the lean awoken holding a losing hand every single round. Tough luck.

He set the table during his internal crisis and heard some shuffling down the room, quickly followed by a ghost being summoned to check the time verbally since the titan had probably forgotten to bring his tracker last night.

"I'm starving," Alric muttered and took a seat at the kitchen table, beginning to dump some cereal in his bowl. Thank fuck he put on his shirt.

"Yeah. My cereal might be a little stale though. Never eat breakfast," Deji replied, shoving the box slightly. He only ate once a day. Exo's couldn't feel hungry, just sluggish from lack of juice. It was a waste of time to make space on his agenda for food.

"I don't mind. Thanks for.. you know," Alric said, gazing down and avoiding the exo. Deji squinted.

"You ever heard of exo nightmares? Don't think Birdie told you about night terrors since she doesn't experience them," The warlock wondered. Red eyes watched the awoken look up slightly as he poured the milk in his bowl, frowning a little..

"I think I heard it at the ramen shop once," he recalled, and shrugged. Deji huffed at what he was about to say.

"Us exo most nights have.. fragments of our memories from before our resurrection. Exodus type used to be war machines, and we brutally murdered anything that wasn't acting according to who we served at the time. It's vivid. You're really not alone on the whole nightmare thing," the warlock explained, and traced a hand over his head, as if he could manually stop the memories from flooding back.

"I'm sorryㅡ"

"Don't be. Just wanted to let you know you aren't alone," Deji said, and stood up to get his gear, breakfast neglected like always. He didn't realize how fucking cozy he got with the titan before it was too late.

Deji never ever told anyone about himself, his memories. Even worse was that he just tried to comfort the pacifist guardian (for real, it just sounds wrong) into saying he wasn't alone and Deji of all people, twice now in the last 6 hours was the one who tried to cheer him up. Birdie being gone really fucked with his head, appearently.

It wasn't just that either. Ever since he took a bullet in his head to save Alric, his mind got all fuzzy thinking back to the times he was extremely mad at Alric for his beliefs. Sure it was annoying, but if he looked at said guardian these days, he didn't understand why he was mad in the first place. Alric worked hard, and was always ready to help no matter how difficult the task at hand.

Deji shook his head and groaned.

What the hell was he doing having an internal crisis about some guy in his fireteam?


	11. Chapter 11

Being in the field without her ghost was giving her some bad vibes, but to have Ara unsupervised with an injury like that would cause guilt to eat away at her.

Cero had left to scout out the Everwoods, and hadn't told Ara about it in order not to cause her any worry. She left Codex with her for supervision, which somewhat ceased her constant fear of the redhead doing something irrational.

She was around the place where that supposed Vex unit would be. If the Vex really worked alongside the Hive, she had to get back quickly before something akin to the Taken king would pop up. After all these battles with crazy entities and supposed gods, she needed a god damn holiday. Not another fiasco to put on her list of annoyances.

Ara had told her it was a single, big bipedal unit. Possibly a Minotaur class? A Gatekeeper, perhaps. It would make sense, since the Vex was spotted in Wyveria at the same time she fell through the gate.

Cero peered inside a dark cave in the middle of what seemed like an old abandoned temple, and she activated her flashligh to venture forth. It felt eerie without Codex around. Especially in caves. He'd act as a light inside the darkness, floating next to her. Now it was just Cero and a sad display of a torch.

Nothing seemed out of the ordinary. Just some slivers of light crossing through the rock above her, and water leaking in from the waterfall close to the cave. It looked normal.

After a moment, she heard a small tick echoing through the entire place. Was it a monster? At this point it was easier to spot one of those than her lifelong enemies. She took a deep breath and stealthily approached the origin of the sound not far from her current position.

After walking a brief moment, the guardian laid eyes upon a flowerbed in the middle of the dark surroundings, and she cocked her head sideways at her discovery. The nightstalker lowered her gun and wandered closer in a soft pace.

They looked to be filled with flowfern and different herbs, the colours forming something akin to a stray rainbow. She smiled, but it was short lived as she noticed a bundle of fabric resting on the soft grass on her left.

It moved.

Cero's eyes widened. It couldn't be. She ran to it, laying down her weapon in a rush of panic and unwrapped the beige cloth to reveal a Wyverian baby. Long ears, four fingers on each hand and red markings across it's face. No doubt.

"Oh no. Ohh, no no no," she muttered and picked up the little life. What the hell was a baby doing in a vacant cave like this?

She was thinking about every possibility. Did it's family live in the woods? Did it run off? It was too young to walk. Did the mother die? She hadn't seen a corpse.

Did it-

A horrifying screech filled the cave and Cero had all the answers she needed.

"About time you showed your ugly mug, took me ten hours to locate you," Cero spat and quickly strapped the garbling Wyverian onto her back, under her cloak.

"Stay quiet, I'm gonna get us outta here," the nightstalker said to the small baby, readying her Crimson. She didn't want to be subtle.

What emerged was indeed a gatekeeper, its size easily eight meters. It lunged at Cero, the guardian barely dodging in time. She aimed her hand cannon with precision, shooting the Vex core with the notorious triple tap her gun held.

It was always satisfying to see core fluid erupt from their weak points. How they spasmed in faux pain at their fate. Vex were parasytes, and Cero was reborn solely for the duty to kill said menace. She couldn't say she hated watching them writhe.

"C'mon, I haven't got all day," Cero taunted and the gatekeeper screeched once more, shooting his weapon in her direction. The tiny exo had no trouble running from side to side to evade the shots, one grazing her face as she took out her Sunshot, grabbing onto the metal waist of the Vex and planting the solar cannon right onto it's core. She pushed it further through the hole she created with her other shots for good measure, and allowed the solar shot to explode once she fired it into her enemy's weak spot.

A weak scream emitted from the Vex as it fell down, Cero jumping back to the ground as well as she watched the red light of the gatekeeper's eye fade. Mission complete.

Cero kneeled down, unstrapping the Wyverian child and holding it in her arms as she observed it. It looked quite undisturbed, curiously looking up at the guardian and reaching out with it's tiny hands.

"Let's get you back to civilization," the nightstalker said with a smile, and the baby laughed back.

-

It wasn't until she reached Val Habar that she felt her exhaustion creep up on her. She'd skipped out on last night's rest in favour of making sure Ara was alright, and right now it was close to morning already. She was gone for way longer than she expected. Cradling the baby, she opened the fimiliar caravan door with her free hand, and she didn't expect to see Ara pacing around before turning on her heels and running towards the surprised guardian.

"Where were you!? Wait- who is that? Are you okay!?" The redhead bombarded Cero with questions, and the exo chuckled lightly.

"I took out the Vex. It was a high class unit, like you told me. This baby was laying in the cave," she explained, and saw Ara was trembling. Her smile fell.

"Codex said you'd be back before.." she croaked out before whimpering and lowering her head.

"I'm fine. Not a scratch on me. Even if I had a scratch, That wouldn't stop me from going back to you," Cero said, looking sideways a bit to see the hunter's face. She was crying.

"I thought you were lost, or dead. The Everwoods change, Cero. You could've become a wanderer," Ara said, taking the baby from her grasp.

"Fluff. Take this child to the guild," she muttered and the Palico stood up from his station, previously having watched the argument silently.

"Yes, boss," he said quietly and accepted the little Wyverian handed to him, exiting through the still open doorway Cero was standing in, a bit dumbfounded.

"Look. I did what I had to. And I'm back. It's my job to kill those things. It's why I exist," the nightstalker explained, closing the wooden door and approaching the tall girl.

"I don't care about that. I care about you. The you inside all that metal," the sunkissed girl turned away, shuffling to a chair and sitting on it, rubbing her sore shoulder.

"Wait, w-what?" Cero stuttered, frowning slightly.

"Codex told me you were created from numbers. He showed me.. videos of you. Back in your solar system. Even though you think you're not real, you're the realest person I've met. I talk to dozens of people everyday, and none of them are like you, Cero," Ara said, still refusing to look the guardian in her eyes.

"Codex, why did you.."

"I know you hate.. what you are. But in my eyes you're anything but heartless, or cold. I'd be devastated if I were to lose you."

Cero was sure she was imagining this. Right? There was no way another person just told her these things.

"I..", the exo tried to talk, but nothing came out. It was like she was frozen into place, her thinker refusing to coöperate.

"Next time, just tell me when you plan on being reckless," Ara said with a soft smile, standing up and closing the distance between both of them. It took Cero a moment to notice, but when she did, Ara's lips were already on Cero's own cold, metal plates.


	12. Chapter 12

She never expected anything out of that kiss, but it came as a slight surprise when Cero pushed her back to the bed, never breaking contact. They fell onto the soft mattress, the guardian sitting top of Ara. She was like a feather, so light the redhead barely believed Cero was indeed made out of metal. It was kind of odd, kissing the other girl. She didn't have skin, or lips. But that was the least of her concerns.

Cero's hands were mapping out Ara's body, dusting over her tender, sunkissed skin. The redhead was in a flimsy top and shorts, not having bothered to dress since it was an ungodly hour at night. Cero on the other hand was in full gear. Ara had at one point stitched up the fabric and replaced burned patches with Gore Magala materials. She figured it looked closest to the guardian's choice of colour.

Cero finally broke the kiss, gazing down at her with those purple eyes. It was different. The redhead had only ever done this kind of stuff with two people, and one was just to "teach the ropes". None of that really came to use when there was a robotic humanoid on top of her.

"How do I.." Ara trailed off. Cero giggled.

"Don't worry," the exo said softly and took off her cloak, tossing it to the ground without much care. The tall girl watched with anticipation as Cero quickly rid herself of the armor, and what was left was so unusual Ara's eyes widened.

Between the plates connecting, a purple light peeked through all over her. Her joints moved, and with that did the light. It was like lava peeking through the tiniest recess, ready to burst out and engulf everything it would touch.

"You're beautiful," she whispered, trailing her hand over the connecting plates, over the light.

"No one's told me that one before," she said, placing her own cold hand over Ara's. Cero had gone still, watching the way the redhead was seemingly entranced with her.

"I'm glad I'm the first one, then," the taller girl proudly stated, and grabbed onto the unassuming exo, turning them around and gazing at the beauty beneath her.

"You sure your shoulder is okay?" Cero asked, furrowing her brow plates slightly. Ara rolled her eyes and kissed the exo again to shut her up. Her hands were guided by Cero, discovering places that made said girl's breath hitch at contact. Ara never thought she'd see the guardian like this. It was quite amazing, really. They kissed the night away, finding out new things about eachother.

-

Morning came like a train crashing into a wall. It was early dawn, and Cero was rudely woken up by a series of frantic knocks on the caravan door.

"Ugh, déjà vu," she muttered as she untangled herself from the still sleeping redhead to answer whoever was ruining her peace and quiet.

She half expected Cayde-6 to greet her again like he did back in the tower that one morning, but instead she found Scar's exposed abs staring back at her. He was equally as tall, though. Damn tall people.

"Is Ara in?" He asked, looking inside the home. He was covered in a slight layer of sweat, his armor hastily assembled and his belts not even secured right. Cero frowned.

"She is, why?" The guardian asked. He huffed and tried to get inside.

"I need to speak to her," the man urged, but Cero didn't budge.

"Speak to me. Ara is sleeping."

Scar groaned impatiently, but relented anyway.

"Fine, get to the hall. It's a shitshow."

-

The gathering hall was a mess. Every responding hunter was arguing with eachother, and the quest counter needed backup questatrixes to offer a somewhat smooth service.

"As you can see, everyone is riled up," the buff hunter stated obviously, snatching a mug of ale from a frantically running felyne trying to feed people.

"Why?" Cero followed, already regretting not bringing her gear in their hurry. It seemed serious.

"Reports from scouts of an otherworldly portal. They say it's a gate to Hell," the man said, and narrowed his eyes at the way Cero stilled.

"Excuse.. me?" She uttered, almost too quiet to be heard. Scar noticed it, though, pulled her away to a corner, trapping her with his giant body. Nasty tactics.

"You involved in this mess?" He hissed. The nightstalker looked down.

"It's not a gate to Hell, I can tell you that much."

"Demonic creatures are pouring out of it, so I'm pretty sure it is," Scar laughed dryly, looking around him once more before glaring at the exo again.

"I knew it," Cero muttered and felt a hand press on her tiny shoulder.

"Can you do something about this?" The hunter asked, a little desperate. The guardian nodded, fairly certain.

It was most likely a Vex gate that needed to be resealed. She'd also have a way back to her own solar system. It was like a two in one deal. Help these people, and return home.

She felt pretty sick, realizing that. Return home. To Alric and Deji.

Leaving Ara behind. After last night.

She knew she made a mistake last night.

"I need a guide to the portal," she said, tsking a deep breath and steeling herself.

"I'll have one by the time you're geared up," Scar said, not wasting any time to get into action. Cero however, felt dread creeping up on her.

She had to tell Ara.

-

Cero opened the door quietly, holding Codex close to her as she approached the bed. Ara was still sleeping away, oblivious to the exo getting eaten by her own guilt.

"Ara," she softly said, pushing the long red hair behind said girls ear.

"Hm? Oh, hey there," the redhead said with a smile as she opened her eyes to reveal her beautiful grey orbs. Cero felt like her fuel ran cold.

"I.. I gotta go home, Ara," the guardian grit out, unable to look her newfound love in the eyes. She heard a gasp, and the sunkissed girl sat up quickly.

"You mean your world!?" She was fully alert, if a little panicked. Cero didn't blame her.

"Yes. A portal opened up and hunters know about it. I gotta close it before it goes south. It's my cue to go back," the exo explained, and she noticed how Ara's hands grabbed the bedsheets until her knuckles went white.

"I'm going with you," the taller girl said, and Cero's head shot up in shock. She gazed into determined eyes, not teary ones. Ara just kept bringing surprises, didn't she?

"You can't. It's dangerous, you're injured and you're mortal. I don't have my titan. I can't protect-"

"I make money hunting monsters that destroy ecosystems. I help rebuild cities. Do you think some aliens can finish me off?" The redhead cut her off, somewhat offended.

"Okay, but.. they're not like what you've seen before."

"I'll judge them myself, thank you very much."

-

Returning to the hall with full gear, two handcannons, a sniper and a grenade launcher, Cero felt a bit more confident. Ara followed suit, having dressed in the same golden-purple gear she had met Cero in. It was called "Storge" and Ara had told her how it came from a godly elder dragon mentioned in fairy tales. That didn't really change the fact that she could die. Die by fighting a war that wasn't hers.

Cero was reloading her sniper, looking around the place. Scar was in the back waving at her, and she walked up to the bulky charge blade user.

"Trigger happy much?" The man said with a grin as he pointed at all her weapons and Cero scoffed at the poor joke.

"They're quick and easy to hit with guns. If you swing around a fat weapon like mr. Wiggly head over there, you'll be dead before you say "oh no, the darkness is devouring me alive"," the exo mocked, pointing at a hunter wearing a somewhat hilarious helmet.

"I've got a guide. He's the one that found the portal," Scar said, and pushed forward a scrawny teen with a scholar's outfit. He was a wyverian.

"Chop chop. We don't wanna waste any time. Let's go," Cero motioned for him to start walking, and he did so with a slight bit of hesitance.

-

The portal was the same size as the one back on Venus. Bingo.

"Looks like the Vex are generous after all," Cero joked and readied her sniper. There were several Thrall, a few Ogre's and three knights. In front of the portal was another Gatekeeper.

"Get your weapon ready. I need you to take out the tiny ones," Cero whispered, pointing at the artrocious Hive mindlessly clawing away at the ground.

Ara nodded and Cero dodged into invisibility, running up to the Gatekeeper and shooting through its core with her Sunshot, effectively killing it.

"Now!" The exo yelled, and Ara ran out, blowing some kind of horn which seemed to draw the attention of the Thrall horde. Cero took out her launcher, shooting at the Ogres until they perished. A stray orb shot caught her attention and she looked up, noticing a Wizard.

"Ugh, do you *have* to be Arc based?" The guardian muttered and threw a smoke bomb in the air, stunning the flying zombified alien. Cero took this chance to chuck another grenade at it, effectively making it evaporate as it screeched loudly. The exo looked over to see Ara had finished taking out the Thrall, and was trying to wipe off the green, clotted blood from the slippery fuckers.

"Are you sure you want to do this? You might not even return," Cero said, and Ara gave a nod.

"I might find what I'm looking for in your world. I'll see about coming back then," the redhead said with a smile and pressed a slimy Hive kiss on Cero's cheek.

"Gross," the exo grimaced. She watched Ara look around one more time, before she skipped into the portal.


	13. Chapter 13

"Another nightmare?" Deji asked, standing in front of the titan, who looked like shit. Dark circles, tired eyes, hunched figure. He'd be dead meat if he were to go on a mission now.

"I'm sorry. I never had them before she went missing. I don't know how to make them leave," Alric said, his voice cracking at the end of his sentence. The guy was a wreck.

"Come. Let's get inside," Deji said with a sigh, placing his hand on the awoken's somewhat bony (when did he get so thin?) Shoulder. He pulled the other inside and locked the door, guiding him to his bedroom unlike last time.

"You wanna tell me what's bothering you? Might help. I'm shit at advice but I can listen pretty well," the exo suggested, and watched his teammate sit on the unmade bed.

Alric seemed to think for a moment, fidgeting with Deji's bedsheets. It was still weird to see someone else in his bed.

"I keep hearing her scream. It.. It went through my comm before it cut off. It won't stop, Dej. I imagine h-her body torn apart, the fall she took having-" he choked on his words and looked down, shutting his eyes.

"It's my fault. I wasn't with her."

Deji's eyes widened at the titan's guilt. Was he really so dense? It didn't matter who did what. What mattered is that Birdie was *still* out there and he'd be damned if he left her to die.

"Listen here. You cannot tell me, after all you've done for that kid, that you are the one that ruined it. It wasn't you, it wasn't me. It was that fucking Minotaur that hauled her into the gate. You can't be serious about blaming yourself. You even dragged me back when all I did was yell at you. You remained calm, like a real guardian. You aren't at fault, Ric," Deji said, his voice clear and honest.

Alric looked up at him, his luminous eyes boring holes into the exo. It seemed to take minutes for him to reply, but what Deji expected..

Weren't tears.

"I just want her to come back! Why did it have to be the only person who accepted me for who I was? She was the one that talked to me. She never talked to anyone else. I felt like I was worth something, and now she's gone. My best friend is gone because some filthy Vex unit thought it would be fun to toy with guardians," Alric rambled, and buried his face in his pale hands with a broken whimper.

Before the bullet, Deji would've told him to grow a pair. Now, he just felt sad for his teammate. He knew just how terrrible the titan felt. Birdie, like with Alric, accepted Deji despite his temper. He seemed fine on the outside, but all the exo could think about was 'what if?' And it scared the hell out of him.

"It's gonna be okay. I talked to Ikora and she's setting up a raid to secure the area and traverse the gate. They'll find her," the warlock said, kneeling in front of the tall male and trying to look into his eyes.

Alric's face was somewhat dark blue because of the tears, and he looked ready to fall asleep at any moment. Deji placed a hand on the awoken's chest, pushing him down on the mattress. He wordlessly grabbed the blanket and threw it over the other guardian before joining on the other side of the bed.

"I'll be here if you get another nightmare."

-

When Deji woke up, he took a moment to remember last night. He recalled tears, that face looked so broken. Like the awoken already lost Birdie. But, their Ghosts would know if Codex ceased to exist, they were part of eachother. A big network connecting each Ghost to the Traveler. If Birdie was dead, they would know.

Deji opened his eyes slowly, and then realized that pillow so close to him wasn't a pillow. It was Alric.

He was in a fetal position, resting his head the warlock's chest soundly. His breath even, and hands clutched against the exo's black shirt. 

"Fuck," Deji groaned and tried to pry himself away from the other male. It deemed useless as he was already at the edge of his matress, and he didn't want to wake Alric up yet. He gave a shaky sigh and rubbed a hand on his face.

He took the oppurtunity to study the Awoken's face, eyeing Alric's features through his fingers. He rarely looked at people, and if he did, it was mostly to intimidate them. But lately, he's been looking at the titan more and more, unable to tell himself why. Alric's skin was pale again, unlike the beaten up blue colour adorning his face last night. His white lashes were covering his less pronounced dark circles, and he looked to be peaceful. So far, the only scars Deji's found were the two on his left eyebrow, slightly purple tissue. If Deji heard Birdie correctly, they were both there because Alric had jumped in front of her just shy of fatally wounding himself.

Alric was in no way a typical titan. Titans usually took a direct approach to things, using brute force to get what they wanted. They were blunt, leadership flowing through them.

Alric was like a puppy in between a pack of wolves.

Said awoken stirred slightly, looked uncomfortable for a second and shifted even closer to Deji before sighing contently and continuing to dream whatever dream his brain was making up.

Yeah, okay. Deji was usually able to handle Alric's antics, but this was beyond his already damaged comfort zone. He was being treated like a literal plushie.

"Okay, enough. Wake up, 'Ric," Deji said, poking a metal finger at the white haired male's cheek.

He didn't move much, just opened his eyes to reveal those luminous orbs. Alric was looking straight at him, and the exo felt a little uncomfortable.

"You're kinda close," the warlock stated. That seemed to wake the titan up. He scrambled to sit up, unclasping his slightly damp hands from Deji's crumpled shirt and blushing a dark blue. Huh. He's never seen awoken blush before. Kinda cute.

"Oh! S-sorry, I uh.. tend to um. Hold things. When I sleep. I should've told you but I guess I was too-"

"Doesn't matter. At least you didn't smother me with a pillow," the warlock joked with a lazy grin and saw his teammate return a shy smile.

It was like looking in the god damn sun. How could a person be so bright?

"Are you okay? You're squinting menacingly," Alric wondered, tilting his head a bit.

"I always look like this."

"No. You didn't look like that yesterday," the titan mused. Alright, yes. He got to the exo a little that time. But only a little.

"You should eat. You look more dead than usual," Deji urged him, avoiding the topic they were threading on. It was morning, he wasn't mentally prepared to talk about feelings. Not that he ever was.

"Fine," came Alric's reply. He looked less stressed. The usual frown gone, replaced by morning bliss.

Deji sighed as he watched his teammate retreat to the kitchen, and he slapped his own head. Hard.

He didn't need a highschool crush on top of a war. Birdie was missing, for fucks sake. No wonder he was going crazy. The tiny hunter usually kept him in check.


	14. Chapter 14

"Cero-0 to command, over," the exo girl said, looking around the field. No Vex. Good. They'd returned in the place the exo had last seen her team, and it honestly made her a little nervous to bring Ara along in this. They were at war. Ara had nothing to do with it yet she was here in her ruined solar system.

"We gotta go before anything shows up. Come," Cero stated, holding out her hand to the redhead. Ara took it while looking around, no doubt surprised by the green hues in the sky. They were at the Waking Ruins, and it was vacant as far as Cero knew. But then again, nothing on Venus ever stayed abandoned with the Vex running around.

"I'm going to transmat my sparrow, don't freak out," the exo said with a smile ghosting her face, and saw Ara tilt her head curiously. She held Codex in hand, allowing him to float as the AI summoned her hovercraft. It worked, good. Her Ravager (god, who named that thing? She needed to find out which Fallen was responsible for her vehicle before she found it) was waiting to be driven, still the same old rusty sparrow.

"Let's go," the nightstalker motioned for the girl to get on the back seat, and Ara reluctantly did as told. Cero sat down too, revving up the engine and taking off to a spot she could get picked up by a ship. Maybe she'd run into another guardian.

-

"Cero? This is Cayde, come in," said girl heard as they approached the Shattered Coast, and the guardian came to a stop, making sure they were safe as she replied to the hunter vanguard.

"I'm back on Venus," Cero said in a somewhat hushed voice, and the vanguard was quick to take action.

"I'll send someone to pick you up," Cayde said, in a tone Cero didn't expect to ever hear from the laid back man. He sounded extremely on edge, stressed out. Was everything okay? Before she could ask, the man in question had gone from the comm, leaving Cero a bit confused.

"A guardian will be here in about an hour I suppose. You saw videos of the ships, right? One is coming to pick us up. It'll beam us inside the craft," the nightstalker said, smiling at the mildly confused redhead. She shrugged off the thought for now, focusing on their current objective. Get to safety. She was unable to get her own ship to her location since last time they went to Venus, they used Deji's ship. Now that she thought about it, they almost always did. Cero's own ship was just catching dust in the hangar, honestly.

"Am I going to see the Tower?" Ara asked as if she could read Cero's mind, and Codex floated around her, nodding his tiny body.

"Yep. The Tower is like our Val Habar, I suppose. We have everything we need there. I've also got my own place, so you don't need to worry about privacy," Cero said, leaning against a broken Vex pillar. Ara hummed, looking up again.

"I went with you for more than simple curiosity, you know."

The redhead drew her sword, looking over the blade. She grabbed a whetstone from her inventory, and started to idly sharpen her sword. Cero listened to the steady sound that made her fall asleep on several occasions back in Val Habar.

"My mother, she's ill. I became a hunter to find a cure since the capitcal C lets me travel the world in exchange for my muscle. I'm trying to find a way so she can walk again," Ara quietly told, tracing a gloved hand over her weapon.

"I'm.. sorry to hear," the exo said, a bit taken aback. "I can't imagine what you're going through," Cero sat down next to the tall girl, placing a hand on her back. Ara gave a weak chuckle.

"I haven't been succesful yet, but the people back in my village said I would be able to get a cure if I put my mind to it. Maybe it's here."

"Possibly. If we can get the portal to work, perhaps a few of our doctors can examine her. We'll figure something out," Cero promised, and Ara nodded, gazing at some of the ice her Rimeblade had shed. It covered the dark moss.

"Your friends in Wyveria, though.." the exo trailed off.

"What about them?"

"Shouldn't you have told them before you left possibly billions of lightyears away without a certain plan to get back?" Cero grinned, and the redhead pushed her with a sheepish smile.

"It's a normal thing for me to disappear for weeks or even months. It's nothing new. They know I'll eventually turn back up again," she sheathed her sword and stood, offering a hand to the exo girl. Cero took it with a shake of her head, and they continued to the pickup point.

\- Alric POV

The awoken titan opened Deji's apartment door, and was greeted with a heavily breathing hunter vanguard. His eyes widened at the man's disheveled state. Cayde was half dressed, his cloak in his hands, a shirt on that said "RAMEN!" backwards, and a boot missing. The pale guardian furrowed his brows. It was 3 in the morning.

"She's back, you gotta go before the Vex show up. There's not a single guardian on the ground, your warlock has a modified warp drive, right? Please," the hunter pleaded, holding onto the wall for support. It looked like he literally burned the last of his fuel running towards this place. He wondered when Cayde had eaten for the last time, and it took Alric took a full 3 seconds to understand what the vanguard meant.

"Deji!" Alric yelled, and ran to the bedroom where said exo was sleeping through all the noise. They had made it kind of a routine to sleep in one bed since Cero went missing. Alric stopped getting nightmares when Deji was next to him. Neither of them had come around to talking about it, they were both too stubborn.

He shook him, getting an annoyed groan in return. "Wake up! Cero's back, we gotta get your ship!" The white eyed male pulled Deji up and kept shaking. Finally the warlock groaned and opened his eyes.

"What?"

"Get to the fucking ship!"

\- Cero POV

They were at the pickup point, but what seemed strange and kind of creepy was the fact that not a single guardian, Vex or even Fallen was present. It was deserted. It was, frankly put, unsettling.

"So this is where you work?" Ara asked, and the exo chuckled at the innocent way of describing her purpose.

"This place, and several other planets. Theres Mercury, which is overridden by Vex too. They created something called an Infinite Forest, and it kinda lets you emulate the past, present or future any way you want. Thing is, Vex sometimes come really close to making alternate realities a thing. We don't need that, so there's a man called Osiris keeping an eye on them," Cero recalled, and smiled at the memories of Sagira and the previous warlock vanguard. Ara was gazing to her, silently asking to go on.

"You've got Titan. It's a moon surrounding one of our most beautiful planets, Saturn. It has rings of dust around it bigger than anything you've seen and a beautiful golden hue. Titan on the other hand is completely covered in water and claimed by the Hive. They're the ones we fought before we entered the gate. You've also got Mars which is like an even deader version of my home planet, Earth. Mars is where our humans first found the Traveler, terraforming the sandy planet. Most of the Cabal reside on Mars," Cero told all of this with ease. It was her entire life, after all.

Beside her, Ara seemed to try and take it all in. It was a lot, she knew.

"And the tower is on Earth, right?" She asked, and Cero nodded eagerly.

"You'll love it there. We have awesome food and I'm really good friends with one of the vanguard. You might even get your own place for the time being!" The exo mused, placing a hand on Ara's soft cheek. The redhead looked down and kicked a pebble, pouting.

"I wanna stay with you," Ara muttered, and Cero returned a look of fondness to her request.

"Done deal."

A somewhat odd sound emitted from one of the grotto's in the area, and Cero immediately drew her hand cannon, shoving Ara back.

"Don't make a sound," the guardian hissed, and stepped forward soundlessly, turning invisible as she approached.

It looked ordinary. Dark inside. No recent footsteps, so it wasn't a guardian. It must've been a hostile.

Cero went inside, hopping over a large rock blocking the path partially. She approached an open place, with a flowerbed just like the cave in the Everwoods.

This wasn't right.

"They're fucking with my thinker," she spat and summoned Codex, making him scan for any odd activities as she walked around the suspicios area.

"Shouldn't we report this to Cayde?" Her ghost asked, and Cero frowned.

"We'll deal with whatever this is first. I don't want to file a report and get ambushed in the middle of it. Look," the nightstalker approached the bed, and saw yet another bundle in the midst of it.

"They're doing this on purpose. There's no other explanation," she muttered, pulling up the fabric and revealing bones of an infant. They were old. Brittled. Likely from the Golden Age and covered in slightly moist soil. They were dug up just for this.

"Get ready, if this is like Wyveria, some minotaur will come out right now," Cero stood, opting to grab her auto rifle instead, and waited.

Waited.

Nothing.

"What is this..", Codex wondered after a while.

"Let's.. get back," Cero said, looking at the bone pile at her feet. It was no use burying these, she'd get attacked if she would linger any longer.

"We'll return here. Don't worry," she said to no one in particular, if only to soothe her mind.

Strolling back, she laid eyes upon Ara, but she wasn't like before.

No, she was holding her Rimeblade as it was pierced through a Harpy eye. Around her was a heap of dead Vex. Ara was covered in acid.

"Oh, shit!" Cero yelled, coming closer to wipe the redhead's face with her cloak, but Ara stepped back. Her gaze was somewhat cold.

"I'm fine. I will be. Look around you, I'm not helpless. I'm not just a person that's in constant need of protection. While you pushed me back, I already felt where those things were going to appear from. You didn't. They lured you away so they had an easy target," Ara said, slicing the harpy sideways with her blade, effectively getting rid of all the acid on it, and sheathed it. "I might be mortal, but I'm a hunter. I know more about nature than you probably ever will, even if I'm in an unknown locale," The now partially burned girl drank a green flask of content, and somehow her injuries subsided.

"I'm.. sorry, I just.. when you came back all mauled up, I don't want to see you like that again," Cero admitted, sitting down at once, her armor making a clattering sound as she deflated and pulled at some grass.

"I understand, but I kill giant monsters as a job. I think I know how to handle myself. I slipped up, it can happen. Don't you ever?" She asked, kicking aside one Vex Goblin and taking Cero's gloved hand into her own as she sat.

"I do. Many times. It cost one of my teammates his eyes. It makes me afraid to have my titan around me. He never hits back, you know? He's a living shield, and he can't have parts replaced like me or Dej. I sometimes get paranoid. I want to protect- I don't think you're weak, or fragile. I-"

Ara's lips were on Cero's metal ones, and the guardian quieted. She scooted closer, wrapping her arms around the muscled beauty, and allowed herself to relax.

They stayed like that for a while, together. Until Cero's comm lit up.

"Birdie? I know you're there. Seein' you from the sky," Deji's unmistakable monotonous voice bleared through, and Cero stood up, looking above her. A tiny speck was visible, and quickly came closer to her and Ara.

"That's me," Cero said with a grin and waved.

"Get ready, I'll beam you and whoever that is up."

-

After arriving on the ship, Cero was tackled to the ground by Alric, who was wearing a regular shirt and sweatpants. Deji was sitting in the pilot chair, also in casual clothes with his guns strapped onto him hastily. Cero raised a brow, curious.

"Nice fashion," she pointed out to the awoken, who was hugging her.

"Cayde ordered us to get to v-Venus immediately. Missions had been put on halt.. after rescue attempts to find you ended up in severely injured g-guardians," the titan hiccuped, and Cero placed a hand on the back of his head soothingly. It was good to know they were both okay.

"It's alright now, I'm back. I've got a lot to discuss with you all, but first I need to return to the tower. I need a break," she said, accepting Ara's hand and standing to her feet with Alric.

"Who's Ariel?" Deji asked, initiating warp drive towards Earth. Cero laughed.

"This.. her name is Ara. She helped me survive," the leader said, a smile on her face. Ara tilted her head in question, unable to understand.

Alric walked up to her, shaking her hand and thanking her.

"She can't speak our languages," Cero added. Alric's mouth changed into an 'o' shape as he backed away a bit, scratching his neck awkwardly.

"Alric wanted to express his gratitude," Cero said to Ara in Wyverian, hearing a slight gasp from the titan.

"Tell him you basically fell into my lap," the redhead grinned, and Cero hit her without any power.

"Tough luck."

"You gotta learn that to me," Alric piped up, plopping back down in his seat. The nightstalker shrugged, taking one of the couches in the back room. Ara followed quietly.

"How long was I away?" She asked, and Deji counted on his fingers.

He mumbled some numbers, and turned his head as he said, "four weeks, two days and approximately 21 hours."

Cero's mouth fell open. Then again, it was expected. Maybe Wyveria was a bigger planet, or orbited slower. It only felt like a week.

"Okay. I *really* need a break, then," she muttered and allowed herself to lean against Ara, who'd sat down quietly beside her while Deji talked.

"Don't worry Birdie, you'll get one."


	15. Chapter 15

They were in Deji's ship, and said exo was honestly still in denial.

Cayde had come to them, disheveled to all hell and stressed at fuck o'clock in the morning to tell them that Birdie was back. After more than a month of radio silence.

"Do you think it's another trap? You've got that face," a quiet voice was heard from beside him, and Deji turned towards Alric, his face a bit swollen from the panicked tears he shed on the way to the hangar. The way Cayde informed the titan was problematic, so the he could excuse the dramatic behaviour for now.

"Who knows. I'm just gonna enter the atmosphere around the Shattered Coast and see what's waiting for us," Deji stated with a monotone voice. Alric fell silent again.

It was a bit deafening. Usually the awoken would chat to him about stuff he saw during the day, or info he read about online. It was like someone had just robbed Alric's personality from him. Deji couldn't care. He shouldn't care.

"'Ric."

"Yeah?" The tall male replied. Deji screwed his eyes shut and cursed himself for letting the titan grow onto him so quickly.

"C'mere," he said, pushing the autopilot button and turning his chair, beckoning the other. Alric stared at him for a moment before a slight, dark blue colour crept up on his face. The awoken's been doing that a lot lately, blushing around him. Probably 'cus everything was so damn embarrassing.

"Before I change my mind," the exo complained and the titan quickly stood up, shuffling over to sit on Deji's lap. Alric grabbed onto the warlock's shirt, and Deji could feel him tremble. The warlock sighed and hugged the titan, pulling him closer. His body was something Deji got used to the past weeks. The awoken usually huddled close when he was feeling particularly horrible at night, and more often than not, Deji said soft, comforting words in the darkness as he heard the other's breath break into a steady rythm. The exo was beyond the mortification of having another man in his bed. He just needed to make sure Alric was okay for a reason he couldn't explain.

"It's gonna be her. No way the Vex could make a simulation of Birdie. If they could, that fake one would be too stubborn to listen to them anyway," he said with a grin, his voice a bit muffled as he was resting his own face against Alric's pale neck. Said titan nodded, a sniffle escaping him.

Alric was too good to be caught up in this rotten world after all.

It was more obvious the more Deji actually spent time with him outside of missions. He finally understood why Birdie was so protective over the titan. All he did was care about others. Alric based his entire resurrection around the whole non-violence thing. Deji thought it was egoïstic at first, but later on he realized Alric just didn't want anyone to suffer any more. Didn't want any more deaths.

-

*They were at the meeting hall, Alric checking blueprints for weapons he would likely never use, and Deji talking to Ikora Rey about the Venus situation.*

*"Hey, Deji?" Alric called, and Deji jumped, feeling stupid for letting his eyes light up so bright at the fact the titan called out. He quickly eyed Ikora, and she was wearing a look that said "don't fool yourself."*

*He rolled his now obnoxiously lit eyes (he barely had control over them) and excused himself, walking over to the awoken. He willed himself to calm down, and faced his teammate.*

*"What now?" Deji asked, a bit irritated. Alric laid out a blueprint of his warlock armor, and the exo raised a browplate.*

*"You been stalkin' me?" He grinned, and the other blushed, stuttering a bit before composing himself.*

*"No, idiot. I've been finding ways to improve your mobility, but obviously you don't deserve it," Alric stated, crumpling up the paper hastily and strolling away, knowing Deji would follow him.*

*He was a god damned tease.*

*"Fine, fine! Stop walking. I'm sorry," Deji sighed as he grabbed Alric's shoulder, and the titan turned around with a shit eating grin on his face. Deji noted some sharp canines.*

*"Just this once," he mused, walking over to an empty spot on the stairs. He laid out the blueprint again, and started to talk about how he'd gathered materials to make a new coat, possibly enhancing speed and defense. All Deji could focus on though, was Alric's eyes.*

*A good look revealed that they weren't just white. They had a tiny, tiny hint of moving blue in them. Awoken eyes were like fire. Their colour always moved. If they were red, you could explain their irises as blinding, crimson fire. In Alric's case, the slightest bit of blue fire was peeking through the white flames. How Deji never noticed it was beyond him. He always looked at Alric every chance he got.*

-

*"You stink like Hive."*

*"Really?" Alric scrunched up his face, smelling himself. He shrugged and sat back down on the couch, eating a slice of pizza. They were unable to go on missions due to their leader being gone and their current posts being removed. It was boring, and both of them just wanted something to do. They decided to watch all of the disney movies that were still online.*

*"You know the way, go on," Deji shoo'ed the awoken, and the latter reluctantly stood up, pausing 'Moana' and leaving for the bathroom. Deji can't remember how long Alric's been staying at his place, but he honestly didn't mind. Sure, Deji acted grumpy. But he valued the company, especially since they couldn't go out on patrol.*

...

*Deji woke up to a clatter of pizza boxes and a soft curse. He opened his eyes, seeing Alric wear one of Deji's bigger shirts and a black pair of sweats that were unknown to him.*

*"Smell better," he mumbled and closed his eyes again. He kept dozing, feeling the dip of Alric's weight into the couch and the sound of the movie resuming.*

*Deji listened to the heroic girl singing with her friend, and heard the awoken humming along softly.*

*"You know that song?" He asked, opening one eye. Alric nodded sheepishly.*

*"Watched it with Cero a few times after recon back when you weren't in our team yet. No matter how hard I tried to get her to sing, she didn't. It's still so unfair how you have her recorded and won't let me hear it," he whined, stretching his legs over the old coffee table and squinting at the movie. Deji kept quiet.*

*"I think I saw it around 5 times now? I also watched that movie with the princess and those dwarves. She looked close to singing, but alas," he muttered, sighing for dramatic effect. He turned off the tv and finally looked at Deji, slightly damp strands straying onto his forehead. The exo looked away.*

*"You wanna hear?" Deji asked, booting up the holopad he had stuck in the couch somewhere before they sat down. He saw Alric's eyes light up and basically threw himself onto the exo, demanding to see the screen.*

*With Alric now glued to him, he opened a video his ghost, Mainframe, had recorded 4 months back.*

*The screen showed Cero lounging in Deji's ship, holding Codex like she always did. Her legs were unsurprisingly lifted over the arm rest, her tiny frame looking bored. She looked around, once. Twice, and asked her ghost to play a song after almost 30 seconds of silence.*

*Codex did as told, eyeing Mainframe for a second and twirling as if saying "I know you're there," before turning on the music. It was an electric guitar, playing a calm song. A strum, quiet, and Cero started singing. It was laid back, easy. As if she was born to do it. Her melodies created colour to the washed out interior of Deji's ship, and once the guitar picked up, Cero stood, dancing along with Codex, the both of them circling around eachother like they had done many times.*

*Cero smiled as she sang, her voice clear as a sunny day, and Deji gazed from the video over to Alric. He found the titan mesmerized. Deji didn't blame him. Anyone would be once they heard the normally near mute hunter sing so full of emotion, even though she was artificial.*

*Cero didn't have her brain turned into a thinker, like with Cayde. Her code showed nothing. No records of a prior life, no brain transmat, nothing. Just zero's. Deji himself had occasional dreams of his old life, before he was a guardian. He remembered his hands covered in blood. His own blood, before he awoke to see his hands metal. It were fragments, and he never dared to mention it to anyone.*

*He hadn't realized the song was over until Alric lightly touched his face, and Deji jumped a bit from the sudden contact. He saw Alric's big eyes curiously gazing at him, and the exo relaxed once he realized they were just sitting on the couch. No blood. No screams.*

*"You alright?" The awoken asked softly. Deji nodded, and turned off the holopad again. He needed another nap.*

-

*"Watch it," Deji snarled, and moved awkwardly with the cups of coffee in his hand to sit down at one of the tower's many balconies. Alric was trying to trip him, and the exo was close to just pouring the liquid straight onto the bratty awoken.*

*"I'm so bored, I might just resort to punching someone to make things entertaining," Alric sighed, and Deji laughed.*

*"Thought you were a pacifist?"*

*"I have seen the light. Violence is my true calling."*

*They kept joking around for a while until a somewhat fimiliar hunter walked up to them.*

*"Avon?" Alric said, tilting his head. The now healed up guardian joined them, looking down at his hands.*

*"Weren't you the one that took back Cero's scout rifle?" Deji recalled, and the skinny man nodded.*

*"I wanted to tell you that I overheard Cayde-6 talking to the vanguard about a possible raid. He's been constantly working on a plan eversince.. Cero-0 went missing. Ikora seems worried about his health," he informed them, and both teammates looked confused.*

*"What's keeping him?" Deji asked, standing up. Avon looked up at him for a while, and then continued to fidget with his armor.*

*"Zavala. The commander is afraid even more guardians will get severely injured. The last scouts haven't gotten out of their coma yet, as you probably know," he said softly, and Alric grit hit teeth.*

*"I'm gonna talk to him," the titan said, and left abruptly, not giving either Deji or Avon a chance to speak.*

...

*"But if we join the raid team, we have an advantage! We saw what was out there! If we just.." Alric's words got stuck in his throat, and he growled at the stoic man in front of him. Deji watched it all happen next to Cayde, who looked mildly surprised at Alric's unusual behavior.*

*"He always like that concerning the tiny robo?" The vanguard asked, and Deji shrugged.*

*"He's been losing his patience eversince we got cooped up inside the tower. Can't say I blame him," the warlock stated, wincing when the white haired titan hit a pillar, glaring at his commander, who seemed unimpressed like always. The smaller titan had a deep scowl, his normally soft face nowhere to be seen. Deji was kind of impressed.*

*"Now you guys know how I feel when I try to get through big Z," Cayde muttered, sitting down on the meeting table.*

*"Please! She's everything I have!" Alric was desperate, and Deji sighed, approaching the distressed male.*

*"Let's go," he said, taking Alric's wrist and pulling him with. The awoken didn't protest.*

...

*"I can't believe I'm the same race *and* class as that.. that god damn rock," Alric grit out. He had thrown his armor in a corner of the living room, pouting on the couch and refusing to look at Deji.*

*"You should get mad more often. It's hot."*

*"What?" The awoken yelped, jerking his gaze towards the exo who was holding a plate of cookies and eating one of said cookies.*

*"You heard me," Deji grinned, and the white haired male resumed his sulking.*

*"I feel ridiculous, losing my cool in the meeting hall of all places," he groaned and covered his pale face. The exo joined him on the couch and set down the plate of cookies on the table, gazing at his teammate.*

*"I don't think you're wrong," he admitted, and pulled Alric into a hug. The exo started giving hugs not long after the awoken joined him in his apartment. He found it calmed down the titan considerably, so he might as well keep doing it.*

*"Let's just hope Cayde comes up with something."*

*"Yeah."*

-

"You calmed down a bit?" Deji asked after they sat in silence for what seemed a good 10 minutes. Alric had stopped trembling, wiping his face with his t-shirt.

"I'm sorry, I'm so embarrassing," he laughed with a hoarse voice, and Deji sighed.

"You're not. Us guardians latch onto the limited things we have, even though the higher ups tell us not to get attached. It's only normal to be upset at this fucked up situation," the exo said, using his hand to catch another tear threathening to fall. He hated having seen Alric cry so much. All those nights. If Birdie ever found out, she'd never forgive herself.

"You're just trying to survive, like all of us," he whispered, and the awoken nodded, a smile ghosting his lips.


	16. Chapter 16

Everything was unfimiliar.

The surroundings, the people, the language..

It was alien to Ara, and it made her a bit uncomfortable. At least Cero was with her, who spoke her language and was known with all of this. 

She watched as the odd blue man chattered his head off to the exo, who occasionally replied. The English 'Yes' was a word she'd understood not long after getting to know the small guardian, and the redhead tried her very best to pick up on the language. They said some more words and parted right before a big, open doorway. The two teammates left, Alric still talking animatedly while the exo called Deji just looked at him here and there. He looked ecstatic the moment Cero had returned, but she could feel the rough, quiet exo was wary around her. It was to be expected from a person who fought for their life everyday. The redhead couldn't wait to learn more about Cero's team.

They walked quietly for a while, some guardians looking a bit surprised at the towering hunter in the pristine armor. It was relic made after all. She felt proud, making a mental note to thank the Harth smithy for his hard work.

"Ara, once I go to my apartment real quick, we're going to give a status report. I need you to be there with me since you have a lot of valuable information," the purple eyed girl said, and Ara smiled warmly.

"I'll try to answer everything."

-

Ara curiously entered the apartment, as Cero called it, and gazed at the variety of guns and armor pieces scattered around. She had her own kitchen, bedroom, and a few other rooms with unopened doors. It looked better than the guild's facilities. Everything did. It was like she traveled through time.

"I wish I could just sit down with you, but all I came here for was to change gear and restock bullets," Cero explained, going to her bedroom in a straight line, even hopping over the couch. Ara followed her, not really having anything in mind.

It was all a bit overwhelming, but the redhead was able to adjust. She was a hunter. Her entire job was to learn and adapt to whatever came to face her. Be it a monster or an environment. She could deal with it.

"You gonna stare or help?" Ara was pulled out of her daydream by the guardian, who was trying to unstrap her many belts from her torso. Ara blinked a few times, and ultimately joined her, her skilled hands easily working through the Gore Magala leather.

She had brought them to the smithy for an emergency fix, and the Man did all he could with the materials Ara gave her, and lo and behold he whipped up a very nice looking armor set. Too bad it probably wouldn't last very long in Cero's world.

"Dreaming again," Cero said, snipping her fingers at the redhead with a concerned expression. Ara gazed at the exo, and dipped down to kiss the cold metal. Cero huffed, embarrassed by the action but she allowed it, looking down at the belts Ara was still holding. She grabbed her hand, subcounciously showing just how small she was, and she placed Ara's hand on her dark painted forehead. Ara could feel it be just a little warmer than the rest, no doubt because of her brain, or thinker, as Cero called it, was like an engine in a way. She'd learned how some technology became a bit hot when left on for a while, no doubt following the same rule with Exo's. Cero's affection was a little different from what she knew, but it made sense. She wasn't an actual human, after all.

"I'm so glad I was the one that found you," Ara whispered, and Cero smiled, shutting her eyes and closing the distance between their bodies. They stood for a while, just enjoying eachother in the peace they knew would soon be taken from them.

-

Cayde, Ikora and Zavala were all waiting for them. Cero, Deji, Alric and Ara made their way to the meeting hall, solemnly greeting the vanguard. This was going to be a long night.

The group started speaking in English, and Ara watched as Cero did most of the talking, surprisingly. It was nice to hear her talk, even though she couldn't understand it. Her voice was soft, like the first few snowflakes in an open field.

"Zavala asked what you do for a living," the nighstalker said, turning her head to the tall girl.

Ara bowed, gazing at the commander like she would to His Immenseness, and answered.

"I provide hunting services to a group of people called the Captical C. We travel through the lands, to help towns and cities. I fight monsters that disrupt the ecosystem or pose a threat to humanity, sir," she said, taking out her trusted hunter's notes while Cero translated every word. Going to a page with Dalamadur, she approached the Commander briefly, showing the detailed drawing and scale of the massive elder dragon. She remembered the way it's roar went through her body, immobalizing her, the way it controlled meteors, how it looked at her like it wanted to kill. Her armor was scorched when she returned from the hunt, covered in half evaporated blood. It stunk like hell. She remembered how Luna was unable to lift her sword once they were finished. She just stared at the huge blade, blood covering her forehead and matting her white hair as she gave a sloppy grin to her squad. Scar carried both of their great swords back that day.

"Our monsters are part of nature. Though some so powerful they destroy everything around them. I stop them from achieving that," she stated, taking back her notes after the commander had seen the page thoroughly, and returning to Cero's side.

He said something, and Cero squinted her eyes.

"Asks if you've seen the darkness," she muttered, scratching her neck. Ara sighed.

"We did, and Cero stopped a 'portal' from dooming us all. I think your enemies have established a good connection to Wyveria."

The man called Zavala scowled, and the vanguard that looked similar to Cero complained about something, by the looks of it.

"We're going to talk about a way to stop the Vex. You can go to the medical wing with Codex if you want," Cero said, holding up her ghost. He twirled up, floating around Ara like he did often.

"Thank you, I hope things go well," she bowed to the vanguard again, knowing that she wouldn't be of too much help at this point. They would discuss strategies she wasn't fimiliar with, names of places and people. Codex was transmatted, and hovered in front of Ara. She followed the ghost.

-

The talk with the medical assistant hadn't helped much. They said they needed Ara's mother to be present for examination, to no ones surprise. Just the discription of her symptoms weren't enough.

If those portals were what they seemed, they were stable. She could travel between Wyveria and Earth. She could bring her mother.

The thing is, would she be allowed to? Would her mom be able to?

"Ara, come in," a male voice was suddenly heard. In Wyverian. Ara furrowed her brows in confusion and wondered who in the world was talking to her.

"Yes, hello?"

"Ah, there you are. Started thinking I got the wrong ghost. I need you over at the meeting hall so I can tell you the plan. This is Cayde-6 by the way," the man rattled word for word, and Ara's eyes widened.

"Where is Cero?" Ara asked. She felt a bit wary about the fact someone else had contacted her.

"Doing fireteam stuff. Nothing bad, she doesn't have her ghost. Sneaking around the tower somewhere," Cayde replied, smugness in his voice.

"Huh," the girl adjusted her gauntlet, trying to think of why Cayde really needed her.

"Get on over, I'll start to catch mold otherwise."

...

Cayde was waiting for her outside the hall, toying with his hand cannon.

"There y'are. Let's take a walk," the exo vanguard chirped immediately when he laid eyes on her, and took Ara's wrist with his gloved hand. He easily guided her away from the crowds towards a colder area.

"Right. So. Zavala hates the idea of bringing you, or me, along to the raid but I think if I give you the right gear and some insight on how a gun works, we can come real far. On your part. I'll probably stay behind anyway," he said quickly, but kept his voice down even though no one could understand him anyway.

"How'd you learn my language?" She blurted, only slightly sorry. He chuckled and knocked on his metal head. It was muffled by the hood of his cloak.

"Yer little guardian shared it after the meeting," he mused and Ara felt stupid for thinking anything less. Of course it was Cero.

"Anyway, what do you think about some training?" He asked, and revealed a huge space when they left the long, twisted corridor. It held many ships, and several people were working on repairs and modifying things. Ara remembered it as the hangar.

"I had Amanda set up a firing range. Figured we'd need one since I've basically been banished from the outer world," he said, his voice sounding quite annoyed all of a sudden. Ara blinked, not really wanting to hear the man's lifestory yet. She already had trouble processing what the hell had happened so far on Earth in the short hours she was here.

"Why are you doing this?" The redhead asked. She was suspicious, who wouldn't be. People almost never helped eachother for free. Even less so during war.

"If we have someone like you in the raid team, things will be a lot easier. You know the way around Wyveria, you can guide us." Cayde said, honest. It was a somewhat strange to see the exo that serious. All he'd done was goof around before. He deserved his title after all.

"So you'll give me a personal training session and expect me to risk my life once more?" Ara asked. She might as well negotiate. Cayde's eyes went a bit more wide than before, giving him a quizzical expression.

"Whaddaya want?" He cut straight to the case.

"I want my mother to be treated here. To have her travel through one of those portals by any means neccessary," she stood straight, easily taller than the vanguard, and she could see him mull over his options.

"I'll see what I can do. But we have to secure the connection between both worlds first. That requires the raid to be completed. We don't know what we'll find out there, and Cero's brief visit will hardly be any help," he decided, and Ara nodded. Deal.

After a short silence, Cayde piped up and turned around, the sound of a gun being reloaded was heard.

"First off, do you know how to fire a gun?" The exo said, and Ara rolled her eyes. Of course. She had tons of bowguns at home.

"As long as you keep me away from bows, I'll be fine," Ara laughed. She'd always been a terrible bow user. One time she even shot Scar's foot by accident during a Rajang hunt. The guy laughed it off but Ara felt bad for days.

"Alright. Let's start with something simple," he said, and shoved his own weapon in her hands. It was worn, but well taken care of. It had a spade on the side of the frame, a white colour.

"Be careful with my Ace," he said. Good measure, alright. She knew. Maybe she could learn Cayde how to use a longsword next. Have him swing around her Rimeblade like a maniac. The thought made her giggle softly.

"Just aim, don't falter. Exhale as you tap. You can miss but you can't afford to waste precious seconds if several hostiles are coming for you. Hearing the enemy is the best way of fighting, but I guess I don't have to tell you that one," he grinned at her, and she took a ready stance.

Heeding his instructions, she aimed the Ace at her dummy target, exhaling softly and tenderly pulling the trigger. The gun was easily one of the best ranged weapons she's ever held.

"Woah, Bullseye!" He clapped, and some other guardians cheered her on.

"Thanks," she said sheepishly.

She noticed how Cayde pulled some sort of lever, and several targets started moving. Okay, she could handle that. Aiming once more, she tapped the trigger three times, effectively hitting two in the head.

"Seems you got a knack for this stuff," he mused.

-

At some point, Cayde had joined her in target practice with his knives, and now they were competing who hit the most heads. Cayde was winning, much to Ara's chagrin. Having a gun didn't mean an automatic win, but to lose against some kitchen knives kinda got on her nerves.

Meanwhile a big crowd of guardians and mechanics were watching, some eating snacks as they enjoyed the show. Ara had abandoned her heavy cape, the thing crumpled up somewhere in a corner, and she was trying to rile up the vanguard by stealing his heads, and it worked.

"That was mine, strawberry!" He yelled, his knife resting between a bullet hole in the dummy. She'd succesfully done this about 10 times now, and she could feel Cayde getting grumpy.

"There's plenty, Vanguard, just aim somewhere else," she said with a challenging grin, twirling the exo's gun in her hand before she reloaded the rubber bullets.

"Oh my god that's my line," he irked, throwing three more knives and groaning when Ara hit two of his targets before him.

"Why so sad? I'm having fun," the redhead shrugged innocently, and saw Cayde's mouth LED light up several times befoee he gave up on his sentence, grumbling in English under his breath.

"Get 'im, tiger," Ara suddenly heard from the sidelines. She jerked her head around and saw Cero's fimiliar face. She was thoroughly enjoying her vanguards frustration.

"Okay, okay. Fine. How about this. Cero has a cannon that's close to mine. I take my Ace back, and you take hers? Deal? Please say deal. Otherwise I'm breaking a bulb," the male exo rambled, holding out an impatient hand. Ara laughed at the discomfort of the man, and gave him his weapon back. She heard a "Catch!" From the tiny guardian and saw a polished, almost diamond glowing hand cannon flying her way. She caught it, observing it promptly before loading the magazine with rubber bullets like she did with the Ace.

Once they were ready, they reset their score and tried again.

The crowd roared as both of them fired their guns, not waiting a beat to count their 'kills'. A warlock had taken the liberty to count their score fair and square, and Ara was thrilled. She heard Cayde say some obscene taunts, and she fired back with her own quick wit.

...

They were beat, the concentration flying away once a whistle was heard from the unofficial ref, and they both lowered their weapons.

Everyone was quiet. The two contenders had long stopped counting.

"76 to 71, Cayde wins!" The warlock yelled, and their audience broke loose. Popcorn and helmets flew into the air. There were easily a hundred people gathered.

"So clooooose!" Ara groaned, and flopped down on the concrete floor, sagging into a sad bunch. She saw a hand reach out for her, and it was Cayde. With a smug grin, of course. She took his hand anyway.

The man hoisted her up and shook her since ungloved hand.

"Good game. You got spirit," he said, and Ara snorted.

"Didn't do that bad for an old man," she taunted, and got just the response she wanted from the hunter vanguard.

"Hey! I'm not old! Just well worn!" If he could puff his cheeks, Ara believed they would be as puffed as possible. She laughed.


	17. Chapter 17

The exo huffed, watching as Alric cleaned the auto rifle he'd only ever used twice since his rebirth. He was sporting a white shirt and some gray jogging pants, and Deji himself was wearing shorts and no shirt, since he was oiling up his limbs while sitting on the carpeted floor. He noticed the strain in his battered parts two days ago, and his hinges were actually making noise. Banshee gave him some high quality oil, and it worked like a charm.

They didn't have a clear, even after the briefing, and being stationed on a planet you couldn't go to was.. annoying, to say the least. He had heard Cayde receive a scolding for sending "two perfectly functioning guardians" to the potential suicide pit that was Venus at the moment. It was ridiculous, who else would pick up Birdie if not for her team?

He scrolled through the news after being done with his self maintenance, coming across the improvised match Cayde and Ara had last night. To no ones surprise the vanguard won, but to have that redhead so close in score, even though she never held a gun, it was unnerving.

Cayde had no problem with training the woman for some reason, and Birdie seemed to really like her. Normally he wouldn't go against her judgement, but she was an alien, wasn't she? What if she was a spy or possibly connected to something bigger?

Ara seemed friendly, but he didn't like how she carried herself. Full of confidence, like a new solar system didn't throw her off. Seeing her armor, her own civilization was far behind on theirs. Obviously, since the Traveler hadn't graced them yet.

It was just.. off. He'd have to ask Birdie about that later. Right now his primary concern was the awoken sitting on his ass on Deji's bed tinkering with his damn rifle.

"Go home," he muttered, and Alric's glowing eyes shot towards Deji's. The exo saw an unreadable expression in them.

"I'll have nightmares," the titan murmured, and set down the magazine he was refilling. Deji sighed, making his way to sit down on the crumpled bedsheets, effectively toppling over the weapon parts. Alric didn't care. Deji knew he didn't.

"She's back. You're fine. Why are you still here?"

"I don't know. Habit, I guess," Alric shrugged, the quiet in his voice making Deji hyper aware of how close they were. If he reached out, he could just..

No. No no no.

"Can you try to sleep in your own bed for tonight?" Deji tried, and he briefly saw the awoken pout.

"You don't want me around?" His teammate looked down, fidgeting with a bullet.

"I didn't say that. I'm saying I don't know what we're doing. I thought I did, but now I don't anymore," Deji said, furrowing his rusted brow plates.

"You think it's weird after all," Alric said, somewhat sad. He ceased the movement in his hands, and the exo huffed in annoyance.

"Don't twist my words, 'Ric. I'm just unable to fully understand why we're still doing this. Maybe it's an error in my thinker-"

"It's not. I don't know either. I keep coming back. It's like I can't function when I'm not around you," he pursed his lips, confused. "You.. hold me when I'm freaking out, even though you hate it, and you talk to me in a way I've never heard you talk to anyone else. I can't show all this outside. You're the only person I can really be myself around. I know Cero is back, but I don't want this.. thing, that we have, to stop," the pale titan rambled, his hands now clenching Deji's arm. He hadn't noticed it when it happened. He was too mesmerized in Alric's eyes so pleadingly looking at him.

"You really don't belong in this universe, you know," Deji said, an involuntary smile on his face.

"What do you mean?"

"Birdie once told me "this guy is too good for our rotten world", and back then, I was filled with hatred towards everything. I didn't get it. All I cared about was fighting, agaisnt my enemies and my allies. Then.." he motioned to his brittled face, "this happened. When I opened my eyes again, everything seemed brighter, but you were crying. For me. Your teammate who was hostile towards you. At that moment I started to understand what Birdie meant. You didn't deserve to wake up in this shithole. Look at you," he whispered the last part of his scattered thoughts, wiping away a tear on Alric's face had become so fimiliar, he wanted the titan to be happy. Guess Birdie wasn't the reason of his turmoil.

"I wouldn't have met you, and Cero and Avon and everyone else," the white haired awoken stated. True. But was it worth it? Deji didn't know. For now he just wanted him to feel better. Even if Deji was labeled as a cold exo who said crude things and never worked well in teams, the only one who broke down those thick walls of unnecessary self defense towards others, was the man in front of him. It had always been Alric. Never before had Deji felt so much emotions just because of one person, and he was a robot for fucks sake.

"You can.. stay here. For as long as you want. Just don't cry," the warlock pulled him into a hug, and felt the other's hands clench onto his metal body right away, desperately. Like he was depraved of whatever Deji had given him before, scared he would lose it if Deji would've actually forced him to leave. It made him kind of nervous, but he'd deal with that later. Right now he'd relish whatever it was that they had.

-

When he came to, he was met with a mop of white hair under his chin. He looked down to find Alric sleeping and.. drooling on his chest. Great. He'd just polished that, too.

The warlock didn't move. He just kinda stared at his teammate like he did every morning since a month back. It was nice, the peace. Their peace, at least. Outside was still the equivalent of hell.

He slowly moved his hand to Alric's pale, almost ghostly cheek. Awoken bled blue, he saw it after the white haired male had fallen down one day after failing to set up a shield in time for him. At the time he laughed, now he wished he'd never have to see him bleed again. It was crazy how his feelings had shifted so much in the short time they spent glued to eachother.

He was still daydreaming when he heard a series of loud knocks, and ultimately a door opening.

Shit.

Only Birdie knew his lock combo.

He hastily scrambled to get out of bed, stumbling against his nightstand and knocking over some broken comms and a gauntlet in the process. He heard a sleepy moan come from the titan, and turned just in time to see the lean male stretch and scandalously arch his back on his bed.

The sight now burned into his evil, evil eyes forever, he let out a frustrated sigh and kicked a sleepy Alric off his bed.

"Woah!" He yelled, rubbing his now sore hip as he glared at the exo.

"Why'd you-"

"Dej! We need to discuss *important* shit and you ain't even got your ass out of bed at 10 am. You're a robot. You don't need sleep," the usually soft voice rang in Deji's head, and he panicked.

"Get in the fucking closet!" He hissed, and Alric's eyes widened as he ran and expertly hid inside the messy forniture.

"Yeah, yeah, gimme a sec," he muttered, faking his aloof tone, and opened the door after putting on a crumpled shirt. Also faking his bored expression. Cero was standing in front of him, looking up, dressed in full armor.

"Don't think you're on holiday. Ara has a lot to discuss with you," she said, and pulled him along his wrist away from Alric and his bedroom.

Oh shit.

"Wait, wait! I can't even speak Wyverian!" He stressed, and his leader turned, unamused.

She summoned her ghost and he immediately felt assaulted by a data transmit. It lasted exactly 10 seconds before Codex was gone again, and Deji opened his mouth to say something, but he was already pulled along by the way too strong hunter.

So much for poking Alric's cheek.


	18. Chapter 18

They were sitting at the balcony, the traveler watching above them as always. Cero, Ara, and Deji. Alric was nowhere to be seen, and Deji acted weird when she mentioned the awoken to him, so she just moved on to what mattered more. She could fill Alric in later.

Right now, Deji was interrogating Ara. Cero had meant for the two to discuss strategies, but ofcourse it wouldn't be that easy.

"So you've never seen them before? Thrall, Vex. Fallen? Not even Fallen? What about Cabal?" He asked, not able to comprehend a life without the darkness.

"She was cursed like Eris, Dej'. Get your head out of your ass already and accept that she's a friendly," the female exo said, her eyes glowing dangerously at her warlock teammate.

"Fucking- I just don't get why you didn't immediately blast her head off with your Crimson like you do to everything else," he held up his hands, sitting back into his plastic chair.

"If it helps you believe, I was chasing the Seregios down. Cero found me after I hid behind a tree. She called out to me in her language, that's when I realized she didn't want to kill me so I came out," Ara said, completely unfazed by the crude words being shared.

Deji didn't like Ara. She was 'suspicious'. If the dumbass exo had seen for himself what they went through, maybe he would shut his rusty mouth.

"What the hell made you think an exodus with a rocket launcher-"

"I use machine guns."

"With a *machine gun* that just blew a bullet through a dragon was someone to approach?" Deji furrowed his brow plates, and Cero rested her tired head in her hands.

"The Seregios is a flying wyvern, not a dragon, and I am a hunter. It's my job to investigate possible threaths and take care of them, or aid anyone in need, and she looked injured. Being a hunter is not just about killing living things. It's about taking care of the ecosystem, researching unknown things and learning about nature around you," she expertly told Deji, still looking him straight in the eyes. Cero could feel him getting nervous. That usually meant bad news.

"Whatever, woman. Why are you so relaxed anyway? You just visited two new planets, both hostile," he continued. Cero rolled her eyes but let them talk.

"Indeed, I had to kill about 20 Vex on Venus. They ambushed me. Furthermore I have a very scary exo right across from me. I'm practically shaking in my boots," the redhead said with a flat tone, and Deji's eyes widened.

"You wanna fight, treehugger?"

The female exo saw Ara's eyes glint with interest. "Go for it, I bet you could scratch my armor if you tried really hard," the girl chirped, slightly amused at her challenger. Deji stood up, and Cero grabbed his arm before he actually did anything. There had been instances where she was too late with calming his temper, this time would not be one of them.

"Don't do this," Cero said, loud enough for just him to hear, and pushed his chest slightly.

"Dammit, Birdie. You don't know anything about her. Don't blame me if you end up with a one behind your name," he spat. And with that, left the two alone, the absence of his static voice leaving behind any malice lingering around the air.

It was quiet for about ten seconds before Cero finally moved again and slumped visibly.

"What's got his stick so far up his ass?" Ara said, and the exo actually laughed at her change in vocabulary.

"He just doesn't want me to get hurt. He's got trust issues. I'm sure he'll warm up to you eventually," the purple eyed guardian replied, smiling softly. Deji was cold. He was rude and didn't like people. It took Parallax a good half year to make the warlock even talk to them normally. He's improved, but still rude.

Ara hummed, looking around her.

"Where's that blue guy?" The tall girl asked, curious. Cero shrugged.

"Tried reaching him with comms but he left me hanging and he wasn't in his apartment either. He'll turn up. Besides, Deji probably knows where he is given he stuttered like a broken record when I asked him about 'Ric," she said, not too worried.

"Hm. He seemed really happy when you came back," Ara smiled at the memory, and Cero scratched her head awkwardly.

"He's always been a bit clingy. He broke my left antennae when I bumped into him first time I met him, and since then he kinda stuck to me like glue," the nightstalker recalled, offering her armored hand to the redhead. Ara took it, standing as well and putting an arm on the small exo's waist briefly before letting go again.

"Let's go to Cayde. We got work to do." the guardian proposed, and the swordmaster nodded.

-Cayde pov

8 hours ago

Slouched over his workbench, he took a sip of the strong vodka he'd been saving for especially rough nights as he looked over some blueprints of the new girl's armor he was working on.

Curse his artificial body.

He didn't expect the little void hunter to come back with.. well, that strawberry. It only crushed his weak spirit even more. He hated it. How his mind got all funky and made him think terrible things.

Like the two girls being together.

It looked like that, after the match. They hugged and gazed at each other with some kinda spark. Like they had their own little world around them.

Fuck his luck, right?

Cayde loved the nightstalker. No one knew. Not even him, until a month ago. Until the shitstorm began.

He remembered when the two guardians came back, one having his leg nearly blasted off and the other one looking like he saw the devil himself. The titan talked, though. Told the whole situation. The warlock just radiated an aura like he wanted to kill everything he saw. Cayde issued rescue missions right away, and his men came back all screwed up in some way or another. One lost his hand and carried it with him to the infirmary without as much as a glance at the vanguard exo. He'd be pissed too if his good hand got blown off. Then Zavala declared Venus off limits, and told Cayde to stop coming up with delusional plans to retreive his most talented unit. They broke out into a fight, Cayde threathening to leave the vanguard if Z didn't allow him to work out a raid. Ikora had to calm him down. After she talked to him, he realized two things. One, he was either having an unhealthy favouritism towards the guardian, or he was in love. Two, he didn't know if said guardian was even alive. It hurt like a bitch. Both of those thoughts.

He started tweaking his comm radio waves in the hopes that he'd reach Cero, but it never worked. Next to that, he had several scrawls of plans hastily noted down on paper, maps, anything. His apartment started to look like the place of a crazy person interested in a government secret.

After a long while, and a huge lack of fuel, he got through to her.

Cayde knew he wouldn't be able to pick her up himself, so he sprinted to the nearest guardian he knew had modified his warp drive to it's optimal abilities. It was Cero's teammate. Good thought.

When they returned to the meeting hall, he was less pleased. The two girls stood too close. Cero already knew the redhead's language. Something was going on and he could feel an old, old emotion simmer inside of him.

He was jealous. Of the strawberry. He couldn't believe it, and thus tried to make himself think that the sword girl was a better match for the small guardian, so his mind would erase any traces of adoration he felt for the petite exo. Ara was indeed a good fit for Cero. She was able to roam around freely in between planets, while Cayde was stuck in the tower.

It hurt the heart he wasn't supposed to have.

He left his desk to dive onto his bed face first, forcing his system to shut off for the night.

-

He woke up feeling like shit. Nothing changed. He still had those god damn thoughts haunting him. Even dreamt about it. The moment he woke up, he wanted to find out if the tiny nightstalker was doing well. If Ace ever saw him like this, he'd laugh at him. Couldn't blame him if he did.

Cayde was being pathetic.

He got pulled back from his delusional mind by three timid knocks. He stood up, noticing he didn't even remove his armor last night, and went to open his apartment door.

When he did, he was met with Zavala. Somewhere in his head he was glad it wasn't one of his hunters. But then again, it was Zavala. He pulled his hood up in a bit of a self councious move, and started to run his mouth.

"Look, I know I'm blessed by the traveler to have you visit me at," he checked his comm, " 7:31 am, but I'm really not in the mood to argue so early," he sighed, planning to close the door until the big titan stopped him.

"I have good news," Zavala said, a smile- *SMILE?* tugging at the ends of his lips. Cayde's eyes widened, and he stepped aside quickly to let the commander in. Slamming his door shut, he leaned against it and waited for his leader to talk.

"I've issued a raid with guardians involved in this to Venus and possibly Wyveria. The team consists out of the Parallax fireteam, Ara of Wyveria, Avon, and you," the man said in one smooth sentence. Too smooth. Too good. He wanted to slide down the wood supporting him and cry tears of joy. After his inner battle, it seemed right.

"You.. hear yourself, right?"

"Yes, Cayde. You will go out in the field. I'll have Ikora fix your duties when you will be gone. I know how much this means to you, and I want to apologize for being so incredibly cold the past month. I had no choice. Our guardians are valuable," Zavala explained. He couldn't believe it.

"Zavala did you sleep enough? Am I dreaming? Are you dreaming and am I in your dream?" The vanguard raised his brows high, not believing the big awoken. He really approved the hunter going out, with an entire raid team, to fix this mess?

"Y'know big guy, I can never tell what you think in that beautiful head of yours. It's like one big mystery," the exo stated, and Zavala awkwardly pursed his pale lips.

They were taken aback, Cayde for a second time, by much more loud knocks than Zavala. Cayde stared at the door a few seconds before reluctantly opening it.

Before him was the reason he wished he didn't have a thinker.

Cero and Ara, in their usual armor. Ara holding coffee and grimacing at it.

"Did someone plan a party at my apartment and never thought to invite me?" He asked, utterly confused. Cero let herself in, and the redhead followed with a slight nod. He watched them enter his humble abode like they lived in it.

"I got info about the raid at around 4 am, so I wanted to discuss how we're going for it since my warlock is socially incapable and my titan is "missing"," Cero said with a sigh- a beautiful sigh, and started to fool around with her ghosts floating abilities as she spoke.

"Figured. Since the big boss is already here we might as well just start. Did strawberry eat breakfast yet?" He said in Wyverian, catching Zavala slightly off-guard.

"I had some bread, but I don't think my daily intake is anything like you normally see," Ara said a bit sheepishly. In short, still hungry.

"I'll fetch you some food. Go over the stuff with big Z while I play housemaid, alright?" He grinned and left his living room after he earned a nod from the nightstalker.

This was bad. He just now realized how fucked he was. Going on a raid, fighting together with his crush. Possibly losing his crush. He felt stupid. Zavala cursed him after all. It had to be set up. Did the Traveler know his problems or something?

He clawed at his face and huffed anxiously. This wasn't him. He was the most laid back guy in the tower. To have Cayde-6 stressed out during this coming mission was to say "something bad is happening" (which it technically was, for him.) and he didn't want to make his guardians feel like something was wrong. He steeled himself for the upcoming mission and started to make, like, five sandwiches with canned tuna for the tall girl. He stared at the food for a moment before saying "Fuck it," out loud and returning to the group now sitting around his salon table.

"Here ya go, its fish. Do you know fish? Tuna," he set the plate on Ara's lap and stood before them, expectantly. He liked how the redhead didn't waste time with politeness and just ate. Guardians, especially exo's, were a bit estranged with the whole food thing.

"We will leave in two days. Cayde, I need you to finish the new armor for Ara before we go to Venus, and Cero, I want your teammate, the warlock, to train her further in long ranged combat. Her sword is great, but as you've seen with Coldheart, the weapon fires an ice beam yet it doesn't affect hostiles much. We need her to have a backup weapon in case things go south," the commander explained, with good reason. They didn't need their guide dying on the first day of her unofficial new job. Would really suck. Especially for..

He punched the thoughts in the back of his thinker.

"Say what you want, but my warlock is rebelling. I think it'll just end up being my titan. He knows how to shoot, just doesn't actually do it," she shrugged, and received a knowing hum in return from the awoken.

"I'll leave that to him, then. There's two days. Prepare well," Zavala stood, and Cayde traced his movements with his bright blue eyes.

"Cayde, I trust you make the armor the best you can for our guest," his leader said and gave him a rough pat on his back before leaving the place. Cayde relaxed a little, watching the duo stand as well. Ara walked to the kitchen, placing her empty plate on the counter and returning to Cero's side. She waved, and Cero said a formal goodbye before they went on their ways.

Yeah, something told him this was only the beginning of his bad luck.


	19. Chapter 19

After his teammates left, he reluctantly got out of his hiding spot. Deji looked positively freaked out when he stared up at him a few moments ago, and that was all it took for the white haired awoken to get his ass in gear and hide from Cero literally two seconds after he woke up.

Deji wanted to keep it a secret, that was painfully clear. It wouldn't be good for guardians anyway, having word get out of them doing whatever they did. Alric didn't even know what they had, but it wasn't normal friendship anymore. That, and guardians weren't supposed to.. get intimate, for a lack of better words. He felt himself blush and shook his head lightly, the thoughts away with it.

He sighed, laying back in Deji's bed again. He felt like a sledgehammer had hit him, and he wasn't about to worsen his migraine by moving around. He didn't get any orders from the vanguard yet, so he could just wait for the warlock to return.

He took a deep breath, the smell of metal and oil hitting him as he closed his eyes.

Smelled like Deji.

-

He heard a door slam, and woke up a bit dazed. Some heavy footsteps walked through the livingroom, and Alric knew he was in for trouble.

He hesitantly stood up, picking up the shirt he discarded in his sleep with one fluid motion and put it on before he went to the huge ball of pent up rage waiting for him.

When he entered the other room, he saw Deji load up his guns.

"What are you doing?"

"Going for a fuckin' walk," the warlock spat, not looking at Alric as he spoke.

"Your eyes are red, and we aren't supposed to go outside of the city," the awoken pointed out.

A pause. Then Deji glared up.

"Mind your business, 'Ric," the exo said, tossing aside a random rifle to the floor. Alric sighed and came closer, trying to calm his teammate down.

"You wanna talk instead?"

"No. I want to shoot something," he muttered, taking a ragged breath. His eyes stayed red, and Alric wondered why he was so agitated.

"I'll come with," the awoken decided, grabbing the bag of armor he now kept at Deji's place and quietly putting the whole thing on.

"You'll get in the way."

Alric glared up at the exo. Deji wasn't looking at him.

"I thought we were past this. I'm your shield. I'm supposed to get in the way of you and possible dozens of hostiles depending on how stupid you're gonna act out there," he bit back, only half aware of his own anger building up at the impossible warlock.

"I never asked you to be my shield," the words were oddly quiet, but they hit hard. Alric felt his muscles tense up. He tried to calm down, but something inside him *really* didn't appreciate those words.

"What the fuck is your problem? You really think you can just say shit like that?" He yelled, throwing a gauntlet at the exo. He didn't care about Deji's eyes turning blue again in a flash, and how he looked like he regret what he had said. It was too late.

"You joined the fireteam, I fucking saved you! I killed for you and now you say you don't need me? Get a grip, asshole," he yelled, abandoning his items, Deji, and the whole apartment.

"Alric, wait-" the exo didn't get a chance, the awoken slamming the door shut with much more force than the warlock had before.

How dare Deji say he didn't need him? Alric rescued him countless times. Pulled him from death, and learned everything he could to keep him alive in case of future emergencies. It was stupid. He was stupid. Ofcourse Deji wouldn't change so easily after all.

He went to the Drifter. A man he never talked with except for the occasional greeting. It was a great hiding spot, since no one really sought him out until late evening. He'd been with Cero enough times to know what exactly he did, but Alric had never participated in a gambit match before. He wasn't about to, either. He eyed the bearded man who was working on a few bounty cards, and the white haired male sat down with a thump.

A short glance was cast his way, and then the man went back to his job.

The Drifter didn't ask him anything, and Alric never said anything.

After a good two hours of the titan scrolling through useless news articles, he received a comm call. Dropping a some Glimmer onto the Drifter's desk as a silent thank you, he left the work space and answered the call.

"Yeah?" He snarled, only belatedly realizing how rude he sounded.

"Damn, who shot you in the ass? We gotta talk. Kinda important. Meet me at the ramen shop," Cero's voice came through, and Alric eyed the unmistakable take-away place next to him.

"Already there. I'll see you soon," he said, ending the call. He strode over to the shop, sitting down at the terrace and continuing his mindless scrolling until a human hand traced his jawline delicately. He shot up, surprised, and ogled at the owner of the hand. It was Ara, holding back a smug grin. She said something in Wyverian to Cero, who was next to her, and the exo broke out laughing.

"What?" He asked, still a bit shaken, especially after the whole Deji thing.

"She said you have a beautiful face. Men in Wyveria look.. painfully average, compared to you," the voidlight user translated, and Alric blushed a deep blue.

"You're all gonna be the death of me," He stated, plopping back into the chair and crossing his arms in annoyance. Cero eyed him for a moment, like she was reading his mind. She looked like she wanted to comment on his change of behavior, but ultimately kept it to herself. 

"More importantly," Cero started, "I have an update from commander Zavala."

His leader sat down across from him, and transmatted her ghost, Codex.

"Can I see your ghost?" She asked, and Alric reluctantly held out his hand, Flux appearing a bit puzzled.

"Yes, Alric?" A high pitched voice came from the marine coloured ghost, and the AI's eye suddenly started glowing, Codex uploading data to her interface.

"What's this about?" The titan asked.

"I've created a direct translator with Ara last night, so you can talk to her. Flux will switch between English and Wyverian with only a 0.25 second delay after each sentence so you won't have to puzzle it out yourself," the tiny exo said.

"And.. why?"

"Because you're going to train this beauty," Cero grinned, and Alric raised a brow. Beauty? He looked at the redhead. Well, she wasn't wrong.

"Train her in what, making smoothies?" He tilted his head, and realized he was still sporting his bedhead.

"Long ranged combat. Find out what suits her best and keep training her in that. We need her to be ready for the raid that'll take place in two days," his leader rattled, and Alric's eyes widened.

"Raid? Two days!? I wasn't notified of this!" He yelled, standing up and immediately getting dizzy.

Ara was quick to arrive at his side, holding him steady. He felt just how strong she was, and honestly, he was a little surprised.

"Zavala told me around 1 hour ago. Deji doesn't know yet, can you tell him when you see him? I'm spending my time with the vanguard the coming days so I'm afraid I can't really spend my time tracking down a guy who stormed off all pissy," the nightstalker rolled her eyes, and made her ghost float. She stood up, patting Ara's back twice before walking off.

"Goodluck!"

Alric just gazed at her retreating form before sighing and telling Ara he was fine.


	20. Chapter 20

Alric looked like he hadn't slept in 3 days. The guardian was jumpy, irritable and overall kind of a wreck. Ara didn't know what might've caused it, but she had a feeling that a certain warlock was involved.

"Let's get you some food first. I think you're dizzy because you simply forgot to eat," she said, smiling when Flux's cute voice translated everything she said. Alric took a second to respond, but then he gave a slight nod. It was only then that the hunter let him go so she could fetch some earthly dishes for the both of them.

She approached the ramen shop, and saw the cook was a regular human. Nice change of pace for once. The vanguard warlock was a human too, but she looked as cold as the ace commander back in Wyveria, so all it did was make her sigh.

"Ah, t-too.. two? Noodle.." she sputtered, blushing slightly at her extremely limited English. She had remembered what Cero called the food they served at the "ramen shop", but the whole English thing was something she was going to struggle with regardless. It didn't at all resemble Wyverian, and she never had a knack for languages so that only added to it.

The woman nodded, and held out her hand for money. The hunter fumbled with her pouch, fishing out a few zenny, and placed it in the black haired lady's hand. She looked at it, then back at Ara. Ara smiled sheepishly.

"Ara, here!" She heard from Flux in the background, and turned around to catch a slick looking pouch with small blue gemstones in them. It was Alric's money, and the redhead held it up in appreciation before giving a random amount to the cook. Said cook took it and left around 3 tiny pieces in the redhead's hand, turning around to make the food.

Ara sighed. This whole futuristic thing started to get on her nerves. Where were the windows decorated with dried flowers? The aptonoth and gargwa carts? This place was just.. metal, guns and a whole lot of grumpy people. Then again, they were at war. Ara doubted it would look this barren if it was peaceful. *Then again*, if there was no war, would Cero even exist?

She didn't realize how constipated she must've looked when a random guardian tapped her shoulder and smiled brightly. She awkwardly returned the smile, more a grimace than anything else, and the man, a titan, returned to slurping his.. noodles. Yeah, noodles.

After around three minutes the food was done, and Ara carried the bowls over to the terrace. She gave back the awoken's money and started to fumble with the sticks they dared to call eating utensils. Hunters just used their hands most of the time. Usually they had big lumps of steak with the bone still in it. Great things to hold on to while devouring the meat.

"Like this," Alric said, and held out his hand with the two sticks in them. She copied the motion, and tried to scoop up some of the noodles. It kinda worked. They fell off a second later, though.

She heard the pale guardian laugh, and she looked up just in time to see how otherwordly he really looked. He had stark white, slightly curly hair which wasn't styled and fell over his forehead, pale blue skin, similar to a sleep herb's colour, and those eyes looked like a Lunastra had set them ablaze with her nova. His smile was near perfect, only his right canine sticking out slightly. He was entirely different from Cero. The two were like polar opposites.

"Why do you refuse to cause harm to enemies? Cero told me," she asked, leaning down to try and eat the most unconvenient lunch ever. Alric hummed for a second before he set down his sticks.

"When I came to, Flux said I could avoid fights with my shields. My light allows me to create barriers and hold out hostile units. I don't like to inflict pain on anything. I use my weapons if absolutely neccessary, but if I can help it, I will use my shield," he explained, and Flux proudly translated it.

"I think your ghost told you the right thing. We hunters only slay the monsters which disrupt endemic life or cause harm to the ecosystem. We have no right to meddle with nature, and so we shall leave it. You on the other hand, are at war, yet you still hold on to whatever peace you can. You should be proud of what you do," Ara spoke, opting to just use her hand to fish out the damn noodles.

"I'm flattered, but it comes along kinda funny when you're battling your food," he chuckled, saving the poor girl from toppling over the contents of the bowl all over the her side of the table. He huffed with a smile and took a portion of Ara's dish in his foodsticks, holding it in front of her face. Ara furrowed her brows and took an uncertain bite, her embarrassed blush betraying her.

"I can't believe a monster slayer can't eat with chopsticks," he chirped, drawing out the words like he was gossiping to Flux as he covered one his mouth with his hand. Ara rolled her eyes when the ghost giggled, but she wasn't about to tell him he was wrong.

The great Ara, crowned hunter of the Capital C, defender of Dundorma and savior of the great Frenzy, defeated by two sticks used to eat soup with stringy pasta in it.

Atleast it didn't equal to that one time she blacked out by a tail whip from a jaggi. She silenced her team, never wanting that story to see the light of day.

"What about you? Why did you decide to become a hunter?" Alric wondered, and the honey toned girl started to dig in her memory. So many things have happened since she started out in the guild. She was told a new, gigantic island had been found not too long ago. One of her friends had taken the ship together with the argosy to learn more about the environment and it's monsters.

"I guess I use the job to learn as much as I can, travel far and wide. Every hunter I meet is always curious. Be it about the art of weapons, the armory, or nature and life. Not a day goes by where I don't see someone in my line of work study diligently," she paused, looking down at the table. "I'm trying to find a cure for my mother. She's been struck with an unknown disease," the girl prodded her dish, not realizing the odd expression on Alric's face.

"I actually became a hunter on a whim. The capital C, a caravan group, needed a protector. Since my birth I had immense strength, due to me being half Wyverian. I decided on the spot. Never regretted it, since I've seen so many new things," she finished, a smile ghosting her lips. She looked up at her companion, which caused her face to fall.

Alric was staring at her with a solemn expression, one she had only ever seen once.

On father, after he had been told about mother's illness.

"Alric?" She said, voice shaky.

"I'm sorry, Ara. I've read many books from the golden age. A select few mention the immense love carried by a child and a mother. I couldn't imagine how to deal with the fact she's in so much pain," he said quietly, and Ara saw how small he had made himself. Did he really care this deeply for a near stranger?

"I have a few medic friendlies. If you return to your world, I will ask them to join you, to find out what's plaguing your mother. I'm sure I can get Zavala to-"

"It's okay, Alric. First we need to worry about the raid. Wyveria might succumb to the darkness if we falter," the redhead said with a warm smile, and Alric looked at her as if she'd grown a second head.

They had to focus on the here and now. She couldn't return before the issue with Venus was solved.

"If you say so.."

-

"I got permission from the vanguard to train you on Mercury. There's a place there called the infinite forest. Great spot to test new stuff. I'll be your backup, so don't worry about getting hit for now. Today is just the basics," the awoken said with a serious expression, making a big bag of guns and ammo disappear in front of his ghost.

"How come you suddenly got permission? Aren't you supposed to stay here?" Ara furrowed her brows, tightening one of her twintails and following Alric, who was making his way to the hangar. He walked fast. Faster than most people.

"The infinite forest is supervised by a man called Osiris. He used to be the warlock vanguard before.. stuff happened. I need to train you, so I guess the situation has changed with reason. Let's go," he beckoned her, and she shrugged before joining his side.

Alric's ship was small, and looked to be pretty fast. They got in, and Ara immediately saw a bunch of books toppled over and scattered across the floor.

"What's all this?" The redhead asked.

Alric turned to look at what she meant. "Oh, that. Cero hangs out in our ships a lot because it's quiet and fimiliar. Calms her down. Half of those belong to her. My half is basically just exo study so I know what's wrong with my teammates if they malfunction," the awoken scratched his neck a bit awkwardly, as if the term 'malfunction' made him uncomfortable.

"You're extremely thoughtful," she praised, picking up an exo anatomy book and opening it, skimming through the pages until she stopped at a full body photo. It was covered in sticky notes, sketches of material stuck onto the paper.

It was a male exo, every part explained in itty detail. The hunter huffed and closed the thing, not really wanting to get into it at the moment.

Moving around a bit more, exploring the ship and looking for something that she didn't know, for the first time ever, she stumbled upon a full length mirror resting against the ship's wall. Her eyes widened at the clarity of her reflection. It was clearer than the waters a Mizutsune lived in, and without any mistake in the craftsmanship.

"How did you acquire this..?" she mumbled. Alric had started the engine, so he didn't hear her.

She looked at herself. Really looked. She had a tiny mole above her left eyebrow, and the slightest hint of freckles. She thought only her shoulders had the spots.

Her hair was even brighter than she thought, and her armor..

She wanted to see herself without it. How Cero had seen her. Without the cold iron, without the sword. Without her titles.

Just Ara.

"You'll get sick if you keep standing," Alric called from his seat, and she had trouble looking away. She had to, though.

Joining alric in the empty seat next to them, she watched the warp drive take them to Mercury.


	21. Chapter 21

The raid was today.

Deji looked like he could kill with his mind alone, Alric refused to talk, and Ara seemed uncomfortable with the tense atmosphere around her.

"Okay. This has been going on too long. Ara, if you please," Cero said, an apologetic smile on her lips. Ara nodded and left the room, most likely using the time alone to sharpen her blade or something. The door clicked closed, and Cero turned back to them, seething.

"What the fuck did you two do when I was gone, and why do you suddenly want to kill eachother?" She asked, folding her arms and making Alric flinch with her tone. Yes, Cero was small. But she could kick both of their asses, they knew that.

"You wouldn't get it," Deji muttered.

"Is that how you're going to treat me after I've given you space for the past two days, you fool?" She grabbed Deji's coat, pulling him down to eyelevel. "The raid is in five hours, if you two don't settle your little drama by then, we might as well kill ourselves. This is important. An entire world is on the brink of destruction!" She watched his eyes turn red.

"I know Alric was in your apartment. In your bedroom, hiding from me. You two faught after you pissed on Ara's loyalty and I can already tell it's you who started it. Alric would've sucked up his pride and apologized, but you. You always shove it away and act like nothing ever hurts people-"

"That's not true!" Deji yelled, slapping away Cero's hand. Both of them stared at eachother, wide eyed.

"I know I fucked up. I know I say bad shit all the time!" He pointed at Alric, the titan stepping back at the sudden movement.

"I thought I could.. I could do it this time. I ended up saying something I-" he stopped, his eyes a dull blue. Cero sighed. This shit was exhausting.

"I think you'll come a long way if you start by apologizing to both Alric and Ara. You need to think before you speak, Dej'. We all make mistakes, but they can be prevented if you don't let your frustration get the best of you, okay? I don't care what you guys did, I won't rat you out to the commander. Just be careful," she sighed, eyeing them both. Alric was even paler than usual. He was staring at the exo, his hand halfway in the air. Deji was just frozen in place.

"I'll be with Ara. Take your time, knock on my bedroom door when you're ready to talk to her," the nightstalker finished, leaving them be.

-

"Is everything okay?" The redhead asked, brushing her hair in front of an old mirror Cero hadn't used in years. Her blade was resting on Cero's bed, unsheathed. Eversince Alric had trained her, she had a weird fixation on mirrors. Sitting in front of them for more than an hour, just looking. Not even doing anything. Just.. staring at herself.

"It's gonna be", Cero replied, tracing the cold metal of the sword. Her hand immediately got covered in a layer of ice, and she watched it melt slowly, listening to the soft hum of Ara's song as she tamed her locks.

It had become a common thing. Them just quietly enjoying the time they had, and Ara often putting paint on her face or trying new hairstyles. It would end soon, she'd see Ara fight. Kill countless of Vex, possibly other hostiles. She was nervous, but Ara seemed laid back.

"Aren't you scared? You're not a guardian. You could die," Cero whispered. the redhead stopped humming, and turned to look at the exo with a smile.

"You think I'll die so easily?" She grinned, walking on her knees and resting her hands and head on Cero's tighs.

"Of-ofcourse not. I was just asking," Cero stuttered. Ara was too close. She hadn't dealt with her in a few days, but the sudden touch caught her by surprise.

"You are right to. I used to be scared. Then I dealt with Fatalis," she laughed, and Cero tilted her head.

"Fata-what?"

"Fatalis. A terrifying monster, so powerful even an elder dragon the size of your tower flees from it," she explained, twirling her hair.

"And you killed it?" Cero wondered, receiving a nod and a bright smile in return.

"The armor wasn't even that good. Turns out its strength dissipates almost entirely when it dies."

"You made it into a suit?!" Cero yelled, causing Ara to laugh.

"Yes! That's usually what happens to my kills."

"So you kill it, then wear it's skin. That's barbaric," Cero muttered, a bit grossed out.

"Hey, it's clean! My smithy is the best in all of Wyveria," the freckled girl said proudly, and the nightstalker sighed.

She wanted to talk more, but their.. conversation, however, was interrupted by a few knocks.

"Ah, seems they shook hands. I'll go now. Goodluck," Cero said, squeezing Ara's left arm quickly and leaving the girl confused.

The guardian slipped by Deji when she opened the door, and saw Alric sitting in a chair reduced to a blushing mess.

"Woah, you're as blue as a bell flower!" She noted, and watched the titan hide his face quickly, slumping even more.

"Just go.."


	22. Chapter 22

Cero left behind a cold silence.

Alric refused to back down. Deji was wrong. It was high time he took responsibility for hurting others.

"You gonna talk or did you turn into a statue?" Alric shrugged. It was no use stalling this any longer. Cero was right, there was no time for this.

"I'll talk," came a small reply. The titan raised a brow, having expected Deji to lash out or ignore him.

"Go on then," Alric sighed, sitting down on a chair free of hunter gear.

"I'll start with aplogizing.. I took you for granted. I shouldn't have. Ara seemed so cool with it all that I was suspicious of her, and I got frustrated when Cero didn't take me seriously. I took it out on you. Said something I regret," he came closer, his hand running through Alric's hair with the care he only showed if the titan had a panic attack.

"What-"

"I thought about this. Us," he continued, voice still so quiet the awoken strained to hear it.

"I go crazy when I see you in my bed, I can barely control myself. When you stretch and moan in the morning. Do you have any idea what you do to me? The way you smile, I just.. I'm sorry, 'Ric."

Alric heard him sigh, retracting his metal hand. He knew he was blushing like crazy, but none of that mattered.

The titan finally knew why Deji hadn't ever done anything beyond hugging him for comfort.

"You're an exo. That's why you think it's unfit to do this?" He guessed, and stood up, placing his lips onto Deji's. It tasted like rusted metal. He didn't care.

As much as Deji was a jerk, he could also be sweet. And only Alric knew this side of him.

"What are you-" Deji whispered, obviously surprised. 

"Kissing you! Didn't you ever read any books? You could at least return it.." he muttered, stepping back after the failed attempt. He felt his blood rush to his head, and he already regretted his boldness.

He heard a sputter, looking up with a pout. His eyes widened at just what he saw.

Deji was smiling. Laughing even.

"Holy shit.." Alric muttered.

"I'm a robot, 'Ric. Kissing's kinda hard for me. I can make it up to you in other ways, though. After the raid," he said, his smile turning into a grin. Alric gulped. Oh.

"B-bastard! I still haven't forgiven you!"

"Oh, you threw yourself onto me. I think that counts," Deji cocked his head, shrugged, and turned to leave to Cero's bedroom to talk to the redhead.

"Ugh!"


	23. Chapter 23

It happened way too quick. Deji apologized, said he wouldn't doubt her again and then he left with the titan. Kinda dragged him along, to be honest.

It was good he tried to reason, but his poor comunnication skills didn't make it easy. And there she thought Karma's letters were short and lacking in words.

At least she knew now that it really wasn't her who was at fault here. Guardians had a very different way of speaking, and acting. They were always blunt, even Alric, and they never wasted time.

Hunters on the other hand always lounged around, they were easygoing and took time to talk or help people who had the tiniest problems. It was something she needed to adjust to.

*

"Keep your hands steady, you aren't shooting a bee," Alric sighed. They were in the Infinite Forest, and two Fallen were approaching them.

"I'm trying," she muttered before shooting. It went straight past the nasty looking alien. This was way different from the target shooting she'd done with Cayde. Back there it was as easy as throwing a puddle pod, but out here it was like all she did was miss.

"Maybe you're more of a close range person," the titan shrugged, putting up a barrier with one simple motion of his hand. He started rummaging through his huge bag of guns, and pulled out a pretty big, chunky weapon.

"What's that?" The hunter asked, lowering her handcannon and joining his side.

"Shotgun. Does massive damage in close range. Since you cant really focus your aim well yet, this thing might be more handy than anything else at the moment. I can't improve your aim in two days, but I can teach you how to use this," he said with a smile, handing her the brightly coloured shotgun.

"What's with the colour?" The girl turned the weapon, watching the sun reflect off of the purple and blue pearlescent.

"Blame Flux. She loves colourful things. Let's go before we run out of time," he said with a roll of his eyes, retracting his barrier.

-

Practice went pretty okay. The shotgun turned out to he much more Ara's thing, and she succesfully hunted down her targets. Alric kept a close eye on her the entire time, and the redhead started to understand just how skilled the the awoken really was. He used his barriers as a maze to lead hostiles to Ara, protected incoming fire and it looked like he had eyes on the entire battlefield at once. It was fascinating, and gave her a lot of new hunting ideas.

They were on their way back after a quick report to Cayde, and the vanguard had told them to come to his working station in the hangar.

"It's probably about your armor," Alric perked up from his chair. Ara was sketching in her notebook, humming at the titan.

"I hope it fits. Smithies tend to get my measurements wrong even after taking them," she replied, tearing out the paper she finished her drawing on and stuck it onto the ship wall. It was already filled with notes and blueprints, but she managed to find a spot.

It was a Kushala Daora. This world full of metal reminded her of the elder dragon.

-

"So I made you some gear that most resembles what you're used to. It's heavy titan armor, but I made it with a few alterations. For example I made a little strap that can hold your sword, and since you'll probably use the environment to your advantage, I added some extra pouches. Our ghosts can't really transmat random stuff in the middle of combat so this is the best I could do. Your helmet has infrared sight, enhanced zoom, like binoculars but more awesome, and alerts you when there's movement behind you that isn't friendly."

Ara ogled the suit in front of her, barely paying attention to the book of onstructions Cayde just gave her. It looked unlike anything she'd seen so far, but at this point only grass and trees seemed fimiliar to her on earth.

She traced the metal with her hand carefully. It was like an entirely new level of crafting.

"Thank you, Cayde," she said, a bright smile on her face as she turned to the exo. He fumbled with his hood and looked down.

".. You're welcome."


	24. Chapter 24

"Right, so the plan's this," Cayde said, unrolling his map of the portal area. The map looked recently marked and updated with possible Vex units Cero had last remembered seeing. Last time Cero's team went there, at least three Gate Keepers were stationed around the portal she'd been thrown through. Who knows what else lurked around. 

"We transmat on Campus Nine. Alric and Ara in front, Deji and Avon middle, and me and Cero in the back," the redhead, now clad in Titan armor, looked at the map. She seemed oddly at ease with her position. All the nightstalker wanted to do was keep her away from the horrible shit that was going to happen in an hour.

"We need you two to be our wall, Deji and Avon will be the damage dealers and me and Cero will make sure nothing gets too close. If anything happens, use your comm. Emergencies, use your signal. I need the whole place cleaned before we move on," the vanguard explained. It was a pretty good plan, but it made Cero uncomfortable.

"Can't Deji or Avon be in front?" She asked. Cayde shook his head.

"We need someone with a lot of environmental experience to lead us. Ara is very well aware of her surroundings, and together with Alric, who's very fimiliar with Venus, It's strategically the best option. I'm sorry, kid," he said, his voice genuinely caring. Cero grit het mouth plates, wanting to object. She couldn't. Ara had made sure she didn't need to be watched like a kid. She thought back at the memory of seeing Ara covered in the same Vex acid that lead to their meeting. She'd downed fifteen ambushing Goblins in less than a minute. Cero closed her eyes and let it go.

"Once we enter the Citadel, I need us to stay together. If someone strays, it could become fatal to Ara or even us," the gunslinger continued, placing his index finger on an open space not too far from the Vex base. It was a large circular area south from the giant pillars.

"We stay here until we cleared the area, guarded by Avon's Well of Radiance and Alric's barriers. Focus your fire on the bigger units since they run in a network. Taking out the big ones can weaken the smaller enemies. Possibly. Just shoot 'em," Cayde concluded. It stayed quiet for a bit.

"Great advice, mr. Vanguard," Deji commented sarcastically and Cero elbowed him immediately.

"Watch your tone, scrap heap," the nightstalker snarled. She wasn't about to take anymore crap after this morning. Deji grunted at her, but looked away after a few seconds.

"After the Citadel, we reach the Cinders through a cave. That's where the portal is, providing it's still there. Be on guard for ambushes,"

"If we go to Wyveria, I can call upon the guild to help us. It'll take only a short while for word to reach the hunters," Ara informed them.

"Good. That's settled then. Are you all ready?" Cayde asked, and the team nodded in unison.

"We'll take Deji's ship."

-

The journey to Venus was quiet, all of them preparing for the raid in their own way. Alric was refilling mags of every kind of ammo for his team. Since most people hid behind his walls to reload, he could just pass a magazine to them before they were fully in cover and able to grab one themselves. It could save precious time. Cayde was polishing his uncountable amount of knives with a whetstone Ara had provided for him, and the redhead herself was seated next to him with her longsword. Avon was talking to his ghost, the tiny shell Cero had remembered to be so, so upset when the hunter was in the medical wing, uncouncious. The ghost had visibly gotten into a better mood. Avon, too. Deji was piloting the ship, simultaniously playing with a ball of arc light in his hands to focus.

Cero was sitting against the ship wall, watching them. She wished the situation would be different, that they would be less tense. Right now no one wanted to go to the Vex infested planet the way it was. No one understood why the Vex were toying with guardians. No one understood why Wyveria of all planets in the universe, one of the few worlds that prospered without the traveler, was targeted by them.

"Cero," Ara called, and the exo girl stood up to join her and Cayde, the three of them now sitting in a small circle.

"Can I see your cloak?" She asked and the nightstalker complied and turned around, albeit a bit confused.

Nothing happened for a while, but then she heard something tear. She whipped her head around and saw that Ara had taken a strip of the fabric to tie it around her sheath, already using a needle and thread to fix the black coloured class armor.

"For good luck," the honeytoned hunter said with a sheepish smile. Cero sputtered for a bit, watching how the redhead's sheath was covered in different coloured bands and fabric.

"What are the other ones?" She asked, curious. Ara's light grey eyes panned down to her blade, tracing the grip. She pointed to the first one, a red, battered cloth.

"From my father. It's from his ship's sail, he runs an argosy. The green one is from the farmer in my village. He taught me about nature. And this blue one is from a man called James. A piece of his armor. He used to hunt together with me before he left to Bherna. Haven't seen him since," she stopped for a second, smiling at the yellow cloth. "The leather one is from a friend who left to a big island to research life there," the girl said with a smile. Ara's blade was like a collection of her life.

"Why did you add my piece on such precious memories?" Cero whispered, not really caring wether they were alone or not.

"Because you are a precious memory to me, Cero," Ara said with a bright smile, holding the sheath proudly in her gloved hand. Cero didn't realize how Cayde stopped his movements, for just a bit.

"Let's hope we can make more, then," the nightstalker replied with a bright purple lit smile. The blademaster nodded enthusiastically and continued caring for her icy weapon.

Wherever Ara was, you could see her Rimeblade. She hasn't ever left it alone since Cero had met her, and she wondered if there was more to the weapon's story than just a lucky find.

"Birdie, we're entering the atmosphere," Deji's static voice filled the ship. Both she and Cayde stood abrubtly, trudging over to the front, the two standing at each of Deji's sides.

"Prepare for transmat," Deji's ghost, mainframe, said in his cool tone.

"Let's go, guys!" Cayde raised his voice, drawing his Ace of Spades and entering the transmat circle. The entire raid team joined him soon after, and in a flash, they were on the green grass of the rainy planet.

"Be on guard at all times. Do *not* attempt solo combat," Cero made herself clear, drawing her Borealis sniper. Ara unsurprisingly left her weapons alone, already moving.

The crew followed her, not a single one daring to breathe too loud. Alric was heard whispering a few things to her, and the tall girl nodded. He was possibly explaining things as they passed it.

It was vacant like last time, but they all knew that it was merely one of the Vex's many dirty tricks. False hope.

"Approaching Campus Nine," Alric said, his voice lacking emotion. All of them were on edge, waiting for something to happen. Cero spotted a Fallen Shank stationary, close to a building wall.

She shot it silently, her supressor nullifying the normally earpiercing echo her Borealis emitted.

"There could be more, eyes up, 'Ric," she said, and the titan lifted his hand in an affirmative.

They went through Campus Nine without any trouble, but next up they had to make their way through the Citadel, a place known for high Vex activity, so much even, that there were Hive Minds lurking around the place.

They kept on their stride, their eyes all on different parts of the area. It was still quiet. Too quiet.

"I sense something," Ara said suddenly. She held her arm in front of Alric, and turned to the vanguard as if asking for permission to check it out. He nodded, motioning with his gloved hand to Deji, who stepped forward, sticking close to the blademaster.

The two walked forward, and Cero watched with an uneasy feeling how they disappeared behind a big wreckage that was once the campus main research base.

A inhuman shriek, a clang of metal, and a clean slice of the unmistakable Rimeblade rang through the air. A moment later Deji resurfaced, giving them a clear sign. They approached the back of the building, and saw a hydra cut clean in half.

"It bumped into me kinda stupidly. I don't think it expected any visitors," Ara shrugged, sheathing her sword a heartbeat later. Cero gave a dry, humourless laugh, seeing through her little lie.

Her shoulder plate was scorched.

"Come on," Alric's voice tore his leader from the sight, and they all continued to the heart of the Citadel.

-

It was still as otherworldly as Cero remembered, the giant blocks floating in the sky as if gravity had no meaning, ominously moving in a slow, eternal clockwise manner around the huge center core like it was it were planets orbiting a star. No power within the light could stop it from eating up the green planet like a deadly virus.

"Ugly as always," Deji muttered. The warlock readied his rocket launcher, for he knew what was about to happen to them. The team silently got closer to the alien structure.

"That Hydra was probably a sentry. They know we're here," Avon said. Deji sighed at the ignorant guardian. It's true he was slightly inexperienced, the warlock had only been resurrected a few months ago.

"The Vex always know. Why do you think it's been so quiet? They're just waiting for us to kill ourselves," he replied, and caused Alric to stop and turn to the warlock. He gave a long, cold stare and that managed to stop the exo from spewing any more words.

"Traveler shine light upon us, my fireteam is made of angsty golden age teens," Cero sighed, rubbing her gloved hand on her face in exasperation.

"Uh, guys, I think they might've begun a welcoming party," Ara tapped Alric on his shoulder, and the awoken whipped his head around.

Before them, close to a thousand Vex had teleported out of thin air.

"They wanted a distraction, of course," Cero said, taking out her hand cannon. "Let's tell 'em hi."

-

Cero's Crimson screamed through the area, effectively restoring her ammo shot after shot, while covering behind a barrier Alric had secured. The place was overflowing with acid, armor slowly burning away. She saw Ara cut through hordes trying to overpower her, wiping out tens of Goblins and Hobgoblins in a single slash. Her blade was relentless, just like the look she wore on her face.

Deji was wreaking havoc with his rocket launcher, Bad Omens, and destroyed Cyclopses and Hydra's. He ran back, sliding into the safe space Avon and Alric had made.

"Deji!" Alric yelled, tossing him a few missiles for his weapon. The warlock took a deep breath, looking once at the awoken with an unreadable expression before jumping back into the hellhole that came out of nowhere.

Behind them, Cayde was battling two Gatekeepers. Cero heard him yell things like "Woohoo! Come get it!" And "Now I'm here, Now I'm there!"

It would've been funny had they not been surrounded by the entire Vex population.

Avon was next to Cero, sniping Hobgoblins that were about to shoot Ara and Deji.

"I'm going out there, cover me," she said through the loud chaos, and Avon nodded, laying down for better target acquisition.

The nightstalker activated her specter bow, shooting a tether down in the middle of a big group of middle class hostiles, and watched as every single one of them became tethered and weakened.

"Let's dance," she grinned, readying her machine gun and pulling the trigger.

She watched the bullet impact seep through the tether strands, hitting every single one of them equally, before they all evaporated into void light.

New hostiles mindlessly walked towards the tether, and she continued her cycle, effectively downing dozens of them in the process.

"Alric, Ammo!" She said through her comm, and a strip of machine gun bullets landed right next to her. She picked it up with her left hand, tossing out the used strip and reloading the new one, spraying the horde once more.

It was madness, but it went well.

Until a Minotaur teleported straight at her and tore off her right arm.

"Shit!" The nightstalker groaned, dropping her gun and holding her limb, now a pathetic stump with sparking wires dangling from it.

"God damn.. shitty-" she gasped, feeling her energy go out of control.

"Avon! Where are you!?" She yelled at the safe space, but when she turned her head she saw said warlock battle a bunch of invading Goblins. Alric had been knocked out, his shattering barrier uselessly before his uncouncious body. Her gaze lingered one moment too long, because when she turned around, the middle class Vex had shot off her right leg.

"No!" she hissed, unsheathing her hunting knife and stabbing the Minotaur before she fell down, trying to stop her body from leaking fuel.

Cero watched the Vex twitch and drop, limp just like her useless arm rolling down the hill she was on. Her scattered leg was in pieces a few meters away from her.

They were being overpowered, and there was nothing Cero could do.

"Deji! Shoot the tethered ones!" She cried, and immediately a missile landed onto the weakened horde before the void ball disappeared, together with Cero's strength as she laid on her back in a puddle of her black fuel.

"Dammit," she sighed, looking at the liquid seeping out of her arm. She glanced at Cayde, watching him run towards a bunch of Hydra's and throwing his blade barrage at them, scorching their dumb shields in the process.

"Cayde, Alric's blacked out and I'm down," she groaned in her comm, catching the vanguards attention.

"Oh crap, regroup!" He yelled, taking out some weird old contraption from his inventory.

Deji landed right besides his leader, picking her up and floating back to the safespace to punch a Goblin straight in the face, freeing Avon from it.

"Where's Ara!?" Cero looked at the army of Vex, and saw a fimiliar red colour towering above the robotic enemies.

"Get back here, please!" She said in wyverian, hoping to get through to her with the comm.

It was as if the girl was in a trance, slicing and cutting without a pause, before she heard the fimiliar language and stopped, hopping back and sprinting towards the safety well.

"This might feel weird!" Cayde stated, opening the item and revealing it to be a Vex teleporter, transmatting them all away to an unknown destination.

They all landed sloppily in a cave without light, and everyone's ghost save for Alric's quickly flashed up, creating sight.

They looked at eachother silently.

Deji's left arm was battered, but still functioning. His coat scorched with acid. He was holding Alric in his arms, the titan's helmet removed and showing a nasty bruise on his temple. Avon was bleeding from his nose, and his ankle sprained. Cayde was fine, just like Ara, apart from her hairtie being lost.

"I didn't expect them to just keep coming," Cero said, voice static. Ara looked at her, concern visible in her face.

"Relax, I'm fixable. We gotta wake up 'Ric, though," she said with a weak smile, backing up against the wall until she sat.

"This has never happened before," Cayde bitterly stated, reloading his Ace of Spades. Even he didn't have a joke for their fucked up situation.

"I'll contact Zavala, we need to-"

"I'll go to the Cinders alone. I'll bring the guild back with me. When I return to Venus, I will reach out with the communication device," Ara spoke up, standing in the cramped cave and looking at every guardian.

"Go back to Earth. I promise I will not fail you," her normally gray eyes shone blue, Cero noticed. She was beautiful. Too beautiful to lose.

"Wait-" Cero started, before coughing violently. The redhead kneeled before her, grabbing her shoulders and looking at her straight in her neon eyes.

"I know what I'm doing. This is nothing new for me. I've dealt monsters that use the same tactics. I've killed invisible foes and hordes of the same kind. Believe in me, Cero," she whispered, placing her lips on the nightstalkers cold metal plates. The guardian breath was knocked out of her, all she could do was stare at the devine woman before her.

"Take this, if you go," Cayde said quietly, holding out a small purple glowing device. Ara carefully took it, strapping the band on her wrist.

"It cloaks you in invisibility and removes you from the radar, but if you make noise, it'll stop working," he explained, refusing to look at the redhead.

"Thank you, Cayde. I won't take long," she said, using her armor's flashlight to leave them all without a glance back.

"She's strong. Stronger than most guardians," the vanguard admitted, firing up the teleporter once more and transmatting them back to Deji's ship. They had a failure to report.


	25. Chapter 25

It was still very chaotic in the area around the Citadel. Vex were scattered around the pillars, keeping watch for the raid team. Night was falling, and the moons looked ominous in the sky.

Ara silently traversed through the army, striding through the groups of monstrous, robotic beings like a dance. The invisibility bracelet she got from Cayde proved critical, her only way of surviving being the tiny gadget.

She thought it would be suicide. She'd faced many things, but making her way through an army she only ever fought once and miserably lost to was bound to be impossible. Yet, she was doing it. Somehow. Her mind kept straying towards Cero, bleeding out that dark substance.

The guardians were skilled, no doubt. Their extraordinary power was like nothing Ara had ever seen. She just knew the basic elements, but seeing them summon light like a weapon out of thin air was simply put amazing. It was the first time she'd seen Cero use her bow, and the way it killed hundreds of hostiles was jarring. Not even a Rajang stood a chance against a guardian.

Taking a deep breath after clearing a giant wave of Minotaurs, she finally saw the cave entrance Cayde mentioned. The Cinders, Ara recalled. It was a pretty secluded area, and it was without surprise covered by large Vex.

The portal was there. To her home, to the guild. Her next task in bringing her army to Venus would be finding a stable portal that led back to the green planet. Cero had told her the night before the raid that there would be a rift no doubt, to ensure strayed Hive or Vex could return. The problem was finding its location. It could be anywhere. Though, first she needed to actually get back to her world.

She steeled herself, and confidently made her way through the last batch of high class hostiles paying her no mind. It was easy, almost eerily so. Her hand touched the big portal only moments after entering the cave, and in a flash she landed on some green grass, away from the stuffy Venus air.

"Too easy," she huffed, looking around. It was the Everwoods. The Konchu crawling around and a group of Gargwa drinking at the river.

Firing an SOS without any delay, she sat down on a mossy rock and opened her hunter's notes to pass the time. A lot of new entries made it, the enemies of the Traveler all filling up the pages like a quick shopping list.

She turned the paper, stopping at a portrait of Cero she drew back in her caravan. The exo was hard to draw, but the sketch looked beautiful once finished, just like the real deal.

It was hard seeing the guardian so injured. But in the end, losing control of emotions meant certain defeat. Ara couldn't break down when she still had energy to fight.

They weren't done yet. Atleast, Ara wasn't. While the Vex were licking their wounds in their scruffy little Citadel, she would call every hunter at her disposal to help with her purge.

They harmed Cero, they deserved to pay.

The redhead looked up, hearing two pairs of footsteps. Not having a map of the current Everwoods layout made her fire the flare, but she didn't expect hunters to be this close. She stood, stuffing her notes back into her pouch and approaching the two hunters.

There were two men, a chargeblade user and a heavy bowgunner. Both looked to be veterans.

"We saw your flare, but.. where's the monster?" The older one asked. Ara sighed.

"I'm sorry to ask this, but I need your aptanoth cart to go to Dundorma. I have dire news for his Immenseness," she explained, and the two strangers eyed her warily.

"Fine. We were only doing field research. C'mon," the younger said, beckoning them both. Ara began walking, and noticed the charge blader still looking at her.

"What's wrong?" Ara wondered, and the man averted his eyes quickly, scratching his beard.

"The armor you're wearing, what is it?" He asked, and the redhead smiled.

"I'd tell you, but you wouldn't believe me," the girl unstrapped her titan helmet from her belt, and looked at the sleek metal. It was master craftsmanship. Cayde really outdid himself, mixing hunter and titan elements to form a hybrid armor suited for her.

"You're a weird one, blaze hair," the gunner perked up from in front of them, and Ara ran a hand through her matted, battle stained hair. She grimaced at the feeling, but she wouldn't have time to clean herself up.

They arrived soon after their little exchange, and all three of them entered the cart. The chargeblader, his hair slightly graying at the sides, took the front seat to steer the herbivores, and they took off in a hurry.

"How come you didn't have your own cart ready?" The gunner asked, offering her some mosswine jerky. Ara took it, nibbling on the end a bit before answering.

"I guess you could say I crash landed," she shrugged, and the blonde hunter raised a brow.

"Crash landed? Like in the new world with those Wingdrakes?"

"I'm surprised you know about those," Ara grinned, and the gunner scratched his head sheepishly.

"Used to be in the fifth. Needed to return to take care of my son. He'll be turning one soon," the gunner proudly said, rummaging through his pouch to reveal a sketch of his baby boy.

"He's beautiful," Ara took the portrait. The little boy was being held by a woman with a braid in her hair and a scar on her nose.

"Was your wife a hunter, too?"

"Yes. She stopped once she found out she was pregnant. She wants to go back in the field but everyone around her tells her to enjoy her time off. She just makes a lot of toys from monster parts I bring home now," the man gushed, and Ara wished she would one day have a fate similar to him. Her mind flashed to Cero, heavily injured, and she felt bile rise up from her stomach.

Her smile faded slightly, and she returned the portrait.

"I hope your son will live to be strong," she said, and used the remaining time to stare out of the cart.

-

It was past midnight once they arrived at the fortified city, and Ara thanked the two hunters. They waved before taking off to their own task, and Ara was left to take the steps to the elder hall. Never in her life was she this nervous to approach the giant wyverian, but for everything was a first time, she supposed.

Ara noticed the guard holding a torch battling sleep, and she wondered how long he'd have to go until he could dream.

Finally going through the entryway, his Immenseness was ever unmoving. He sat at the end of the hall, and Ara quietly approached him.

"What is troubling you, child?" The counsellor spoke, and she sighed before bowing deeply.

"Your excellency, I have come with news that may well affect our lives, our planet, and our legacy," she started, straightening up. "There is a force from across the galaxy on the brink of invading our world and consuming us in darkness. I have seen it with my own eyes. Next to this, I tried to battle it with the people from a place called Earth. They are called Guardians, and they fight the darkness everyday. They lack the numbers, the brute force to take our mutual enemy down. I come to you for help, for I need every single capable hunter to join me into fighting the darkness, so we can continue to live. If we do nothing, they will destroy us," Ara didn't know when tears started to spill from her eyes during her plea. The thought of everything disappearing, all her tracks, her palico, her friends and the gunner's son, it hurt her heart. Tore at her insides. She wondered if this is what Cero felt everyday.

"I know I ask too much.. I know I sound like I lost my mind-"

"You do not, carmine hunter," the giant man interrupted her, and she gasped at the strength in his voice.

"We received a strange report from Pokke. A hunter by name of Wonder has claimed to have discovered a rift in space that leads to another world. None have traversed it for they fear what's on the other side, but I think you can tell us more, no?" The counsellor said, handing her a report of the northern town. It showed a detailed drawing of the anomaly, and it was exactly the same structure and build as the one in the Cinders on Venus.

"Yes, it's a portal. We go through there and we'll safely arrive at their lair. How'd he find this?" She wondered, putting the paper inside her pouch.

"The hunter in question likes to visit the more dangerous places. This 'portal' you speak of lays in a former Barioth nest. He has succesfully hunted the beast and came across it not long after. You should make haste to Pokke while we issue a code black urgent quest," he ushered her. It was the first code black in history. People would lose their cool over it.

"Tell hunters to assemble at Pokke. I will wait for them there," Ara bowed, and the counsellor already had a feather in hand.


	26. Chapter 26

Cayde had taken over the pilot seat without Deji having to ask. One glance at his shattered right arm was enough for the vanguard to move to the cockpit and take flight while Deji stayed behind with what was left of the raid team.

Cero, his leader, normally never harmed by missions due to her precise lurking movements, was sitting in a puddle of her own fuel in a corner of his ship. She looked at him, and offered a small smile. He didn't return it.

Alric was still uncouncious, and he moved towards the awoken who was laying on the ship's bed, Deji's coat being used as a substitute pillow since the other one was used by Cero.

"He'll be fine, Dej'. He just got knocked around a bit," the nightstalker reassured, and Deji nodded slightly. Still, it was eerily quiet without him, or his voice. He'd be sitting close to Avon, telling him about how to improve close range combat, or talking to Cero about something completely different than the raid. His way of lightening the mood.

"I don't think anyone was prepared for this," the Parallax warlock started, using his good hand to run it through Alric's slightly wavy hair as he stood beside the titan. "It's the first time in history so many Vex came to fight just one raid team. It doesn't make any sense. They're hiding something in that Citadel," he followed, and retracted his hand carefully, looking at his leader.

"I don't know, Dej'. Could you talk to Cayde, perhaps? I'm worried about him," she proposed. Cayde seemed fine during the fight, but the moment Ara had left, something was off.

Deji sighed quietly before leaving to have the inevitable conversation with the hunter who hadn't said a word since they returned to the ship.

He entered the usually open room, now closed, to see Cayde manually flying through the warp drive.

"Turn on autopilot, you'll get motionsick," Deji drawled, pushing his favourite button. Cayde looked up at him, and his eyes seemed dull, even for an exo.

"I didn't notice you," he said.

"'S why I talked," Deji shrugged, sitting shotgun and gazing at his higher up. He saw the vanguard grow anxious.

"Do you need something?"

Deji rolled his eyes, transmatting his ghost and showing the recording of thousands of Vex looking straight at them.

"Answers," the warlock tilted his head slightly, and noticed the way Cayde locked his eyes on the tiny screen.

"We failed. That we did," the vanguard awkwardly brought up.

"Why were there so many? What's going on inside the Citadel?"

"I'm not sure. Eversince your leader returned from her scout mission without her rifle, they've been acting strangely. I tried to ask Ikora to make her agents look into it but I didn't have much luck. Then Cero got teleported to Wyveria, and since then they've been deceiving us, trying to make us stay away from the Citadel," Cayde sighed, his head hanging low and covered by his cloak.

"We need to get inside that structure," Deji turned Mainframe, and replayed the footage his ghost hastily took from the catastrophic battle. He watched his own arm shatter like a piece if plastic by the hands of a Hydra, the thing exploding shortly after Deji threw a grenade at it.

"If Ara returns with all those mortal humans, do you think they'll die on Venus? Will we be too late?" Cayde suddenly asked, and Deji heard a slight tremble in his usually strong voice. He frowned, not about to let the man spiral into his negative pit. He was a vanguard. He needed to stay strong, for the team if not for himself.

"They're hunters. Surviving's their expertise. That why you're so down? Think you can't protect 'em? I bet they might just be the key to uncovering the secret those filthy Vex hold," the warlock spoke clearly, honestly. Ara seemed extremely capable of defending herself. If even half of the people she brought back with her had her level of experience, the Vex would be a laughing stock, no matter how much there were. The redhead had earned his trust the instant she volunteered to go to the Cinders by herself, while all he could do was cower in fear, holding the awoken who treated him like an equal limp in his arms. He was a fool for not believing Ara. For not believing his leader.

"You might be right. I guess the tower gave me this urge to protect. I hated to leave Ara behind there, it's been eating at me, but I guess she must have a plan," he replied, eyes lighting up a bit again. 

"You're a good man, Cayde. I hope you know this raid wasn't your fault," Deji leaned forward, patting the vanguard on his shoulder. It would be hard to recover from this, but he trusted his fellow exo to stay afloat.

"I'll plan ahead for when Ara contacts us," Cayde said, and Deji grinned before leaving the cockpit.

-

Cero had turned off from her lack of fuel, and Alric was still blacked out when they entered the hangar.

Deji, holding Alric, got out after his other two teammates, Cayde and Avon, carefully carried his fireteam leader over to Amanda for maintenance.

"I'm gonna stay with Alric, can you two do the briefing to Zavala?" the warlock asked Cayde, and said man simply held a thumbs up as he was talking to the distressed blonde. The vanguard and other warlock were covered in the dark substance that wasn't supposed to see light of day, and Deji hoped Amanda was capable enough to fix the nightstalker's mysterious body without Alric around. The titan had studied exo's so much in case this ever happened, only to faint by a filthy Minotaur during a critical moment. He was one of the only people who actually knew how to repair Cero, since she was a bit different from the usual exo.

It was near three am, so not a lot of guardians were at the medical wing. Deji entered the emergency room and saw a petite woman holding some files and cleaning up a coffee stained table. Deji cleared his throat, and the woman jumped before turning around.

"Can I get some help?" He asked, and the woman gasped before ushering him to an unoccupied room.

"What happened?" She immediately spoke while readying some medical riffraff.

"I didn't see it, but according to my teammate he got melee'd by a Minotaur and promptly called it a day," the warlock gave a little chuckle and laid the titan on the bed.

"Minotaur, huh. They pack a nasty punch. Where were you stationed?" The brunette continued, expertly stripping all the heavy armor off of the awoken.

"We were part of the raid team that went to Venus," Deji answered, and her hands stopped moving immediately.

"How.. how did it go?" She almost whispered. She looked scared.

"Utter failure. I can't give you any details yet, but I can say it wasn't as pretty your new patient," the exo sighed, looking at his poor excuse of a right arm. The limb was absolutely wrecked and felt numb to the touch. He'd need a new one soon.

"What's his name, guardian?" The nurse continued her stream of questions, and inserted an IV with slightly glowing liquid inside Alric's arm.

"Alric, titan class, obviously. Works with Cero-0."

"The wiped exodus? Is she doing okay?"

"Passed out on Hollidays sparrow table. Though I don't think she'll turn her zero into a one anytime soon," he answered while plopping down in the queasy chair against the wall. So that's what they called her these days. He knew her code was just a bunch of zero's, but that nickname was new. It was a miracle she could even move, talk or be self aware.

"I wish it hadn't come to this," the brunette said solemnly, checking the awoken for any more injuries. He seemed okay, save for the nasty bruise that covered the side of his head. "He might wake up confused, or have no recollection of what happened. I think he's fine otherwise, but we'll see when he opens his eyes," the tiny woman concluded, typing some words on a holopad and hanging it at the end of Alric's bed.

"Thanks," Deji offered some form of smile and the nurse gave a little bow before leaving the room.

The warlock stood up, approaching his teammate.

The last time he looked at Alric when he was awake was when the titan was throwing up barriers for everyone to take cover behind, dropping ammo like a rally flag and making sure no one got hurt.

In turn he had disgarded his safety.

"Careless. You're not an exo. Watch yourself next time," Deji whispered, placing his left hand on a steadily breathing chest. Alric was alive, but the warlock wondered if he could be lucky like this on a future mission.

It started to worry him. Would he be okay, would he be careful, was he able to protect himself?

He rembered Cayde, how beat up he seemed over leaving Ara to her own fate.

"Guess he and I are made of the same metal," Deji smiled faintly. He walked back to his chair, picked it up and placed it next to the bed before sitting down and just.. gazing at the awoken before him.

Alric was known in the tower as a pretty boy who didn't understand his purpose. No one liked the fact he chose to only use light, but the more Deji paid attention to the awoken, the more he started to get why Alric refused to shoot his gun.

It was a pointless battle. They were protecting the ruins of what once was humanity, given an already dead body to become soldiers of the Traveler.

They say the Traveler sacrificed everything for them, but in the end it was the cause of humanities demise. It's lifelong enemy just caught up with it, and the solar system happened to be in the middle of their war.

And the guardians were left to pick up the pieces.

"I wish we met in another life, 'Ric. Where we didn't have to fight. We'd have a nice little apartment with our puke coloured couch, you'd be sitting on it playing your guitar while I make us some fried eggs. We'd eat it because it'd taste good. Not to just keep ourselves alive. In our garage would be a motorcycle I bought from a shady man with a goatee, and you'd ride an old car that you got from your old man," Deji whispered, letting himself go for once. No one would be around to hear it anyway.

"I'd work in a diner and you would come everyday from your office to eat lunch. Everyone would love you. The girls would ogle at you, and I'd proudly say "Go away, he's mine!". Then they'd pout and you'd laugh," he chuckled, but he felt a terrible pain deep down within.

"I wish-" the exo choked on his words, unable to say any more and grabbing Alric's hand. He buried his face in the empty space of the mattress, and sighed. His head felt heavy, the events of today finally taking its toll on his battered body. He was tired. Maybe, for a little bit. He could sleep.


	27. Chapter 27

Ara arrived at Pokke village a week later. A storm, and a Gammoth giving birth had delayed her journey. Looking back, it could've been worse. There could be a Deviljho waiting to eat her in the midst of the snowstorm for all she knew. Nature was unpredictable.

Setting foot in the guest cabin, she immediately felt the warmth of a nice fire. The walls were adorned with bulldrome pelts, and the bed in the corner of the cozy place had knitted Moofah blankets to keep a sleeping body warm and well rested in the cold night.

Wonder would meet her here, she was told by the village elder. The hunter had been doing jobs, running errands and protecting the few people in these barren lands for a good five years now. He knew a lot about the Tundra, and the monsters roaming around the mountains.

Still, it made her anxious. Who would this Wonder be? A gruff blademaster with a scar across his eye? A bearded heavy armored gunner with wyverian features like Ara herself?

She touched her slightly pointed ear, and smiled when she felt the hat she was wearing. The elder had plopped it onto her head the second she saw her, and Ara had greatly appreciated it. Her armor protected her from frostbite, but her head was still uncomfortably cold in the northern region.

Amidst her thoughts she heard the creak of a door opening, and she turned her entire body to the stranger that entered.

He was tall. Taller than her, the man having to duck slightly to fit his entire body through the doorway. For the first time since her teen years she had to look up to meet eyes.

The face she expected was everything short of a barbaric hunter who fought brute wyverns for a living. He was pale, almost ghostly, and his ashen blonde hair was in a loose ponytail. His eyes were a beautiful green, and he had not a single scar on him. He was wearing Barioth armor, and had a charge blade strapped behind him.

"Are you Ara from the code black quest?" He asked, and Ara nodded once before looking down. She couldn't believe she was about to send dozens of hunters to Venus. Though, she doubted they would blame her. Hunters protected their lands. They would understand what was important in the long run.

"Ah, so it wasn't a fluke. I'm Wonder. Heard a lot about you. The hunter who traveled to another world. What's it like?" The man, Wonder, sat down at the harth and gazed at the fire. His frame lit up orange, casting him in a warm light.

"It's bad. Terrible, actually. Imagine all the towns deserted and bodies rotting to bone in corners of houses. The surviving people having to take shelter in a walled city, never being able to get out for they will perish instantly by the pawns of darkness," she said dully, her hands forming into fists. She didn't want her world to end up like Earth. The Traveler wasn't with them, they didn't have guardians to protect their people.

"I would rather perish than be stuck behind a wall," Wonder sighed, prodding at the fire with a stick and after a moment of silence throwing it in the flame. Ara thought the same.

"So what's the plan?" He asked, and the redhead took a deep breath, taking her notes out and opening the page to a basic Vex Goblin.

"This is our enemy. It isn't like the frenzy, or apex monsters. They are all connected, like a hive mind. Our goal is to get into a megastructure they built and find out what they're hiding from us while thinning out their numbers as much as we can. There are thousands of these guys." Ara explained, showing every single Vex she sketched.

"You want to surprise them?" The chargeblader tilted his head slightly, and Ara nodded.

"The guardians I fought with have made significant damage to their army already. If we hit them again we can break through and enter the Citadel, our end destination," she continued, and Wonder hummed.

"Seems like a good plan, but how do we know where we are once we go through this rift with our hunters? Won't they notice us?"

"I have a communication system that has contact with the guardians. They have advanced maps of Venus and they can join us within an hour of me notifying them. I promised I'd let them know, so that wont be a problem," the redhead grinned, and Wonder seemed agree with the plan.

"We need to give a crash course to the people joining this fight. Make them aware of the enemy behavior," the ashen haired male scratched his head. "What if you hang up the notes on the bulletin board so they can look at it and memorize it when they arrive at pokke?"

"Sounds good. The guild said they'd need to bring their own tents so the village won't get too crowded. Most will stay at the foot of the mountain. I'll set up another board there," Ara said, already copying her notes so she could distribute them on both places.

"Make sure it's covered by a tent, though. It's windy out," he smiled, and Ara laughed.

"Thanks, I'll get to it then."

-

The following days, hunter squads in various sizes arrived at the small town. Ara and Wonder explained to each team the situation, where they would stay, and not soon after the first day people had to settle down in the Tundra. No one complained, and everyone respected her for taking action.

Ara was sitting at a fire with ten others, making broth and roasting Khezu ribs when Wonder joined the circle. He sat down next to her, and took a bowl of soup offered to him by a female glaiver.

"I counted heads. We're at around threehundred now. Most teams brought extra supplies for the coming days, but we're getting low on food and if we hunt anymore Bullfango we can say goodbye to next year's food. I think we shouldn't wait any longer," he whispered in her ear, and Ara stopped turning the rib.

"That many!? I expected barely a hundred to join!" She ogled at the chargeblader, and he just shrugged.

"Missy, Idunno if you've heard, but the fifth fleet joined too. They arrived two hours ago, actually. Around ten ships arrived at Yukumo before they went up here, so I've been told," a bald gunner grinned at her, and she stood up in disbelief.

"I- I gotta check something. Take care of the meat," the redhead hastily spoke, making a beeline for the village bulletin board. If the fleet was there, maybe, just maybe-

She entered the town, and immediately saw a bunch of hunters with unknown armor gathered around a tent. She walked up to them hesitantly, hopeful.

"Excuse me," she spoke up, and they turned around, eyebrows raised.

"Quest leader! We've been informed by the ashen one. What brings you here?" A wyverian woman smiled at her. She was creating medicine, and some of her squad members took a few bottles of the green liquid for themselves while she was talking.

"I'm looking for a hunter called Karma, do you know where she might be?"

"Right here, blazenut," a fimiliar voice came from inside the tent, and said girl revealed herself.

She hadn't changed. Still the same short hair, sharp eyes and face paint identical to the day she left for Astera.

"Code black went all the way to the new world. As soon as the commander notified us, I dropped the armory and picked up my bow. At first I couldn't believe it was you who sent it, Ara. But after a long ride along the sea it would only make sense that the caravan was on top of it. I'm proud, sister," Karma said loudly, and cheers erupted from some of the groups scattered in the village. Ara laughed heartily and hugged her, the gesture immediately returned by Karma.

"Are you a blacksmith now?" The redhead asked, and the other girl nodded.

"Yep. Suits me better. In fact, I built most of the armor my squad is using. If I had known beforehand what kind of enemy we were facing, I'd have made armor for the entire fleet," she grinned, flexing her arms proudly. Ara shoved her playfully, calling her a smug smithy.

"We're probably giving the signal tonight. Monsters will be sleeping. Daytime and nighttime won't matter on Venus, though. Vex don't sleep," the tall blademaster sighed.

"This is the biggest mission ever issued in such a short amount of time. Bet their little metal legs are gonna quiver the moment they see us. Making them regret ever being built," the wyverian woman mused, and two others agreed noisily.

"I gotta get back to Wonder and discuss which crowns will be on the front line. I'll talk later!" Ara waved and received a rough pat on her back from Karma before she left.

-

"Everyone listen up!" Ara yelled at the huge crowd gathered at the foot of the Tundra's mountain. Everybody was tense, awaiting orders and shivering in the cold.

"I will take lead, together with all charge bladers. We need the light bowgunners on the sides and the heavy bowgunners behind them to take out the Goblins. Glaivers will focus on Hydra's, switch axers users will fight the minotaurs. Greatsword users will try to take on gatekeepers together with hammer users, and dual bladers, longsword users and sword and shielders will run inbetween the fray taking out whatever they can get their weapons on. Provide help for struggling hunters. Bow users will stay behind charge bladers to provide backup. Permission to attack will be given by me. Everything clear?" She rattled off the battle plan, and every hunter seemed to understand so far.

"Once I contact the guardians, it'll take an hour tops for them to get to Venus. Do not feel threathened by their power, they're not our enemy. They use something called Light to defeat their opponents. If you get injured beyond your own healing abilities, fall back to the medical line and try to stick it out until a guardian can patch you up. They are limited in their power since we aren't infused with Light, but it should be enough to push on," the redhead explained. A hand in the crowd went up, and Ara nodded her way.

"What do the guardians look like?" The high pitched voice asked, and Ara smiled slightly.

"Like us. The armor I'm wearing right now was created by them. They wield powerful guns and some of them wear cloaks," Ara said, and the hand went back into the group of bodies huddled together.

"Are we ready, hunters!?" Wonder yelled, and received an encore of battle cries. Ara stepped off the crate she was standing on to appear taller, and Wonder started to lead the way to the Barioth nest.


	28. Chapter 28

\- Cayde pov  
It had been two weeks after the raid. The utter failure. The blotch of ink in the current chapters of the vanguard. Guardians had asked to try the raid with their own teams, but Zavala blatantly refused. Wait for the human, he said. For once, Cayde agreed. It was way too dangerous to send good guardians to Venus without them having a proper guide or defense system.

Cero was grieving already. There was no way Ara had made it, according to her. She didn't have a ghost, so no one knew if she even reached the portal. Her comm was dead too. The nightstalker refused to talk to anyone, not even her teammates could get her to speak.

Alric had woken up, but had no recollection of their mission. He didn't even know who Ara was anymore. He had quietly replaced the arm and leg of Cero after Amanda had restarted her succesfully, and none of them said a word to eachother during the process. Cero had turned into the person she was when she first came to the tower, and it concerned the people who knew her.

Deji had been out in the EDZ, disobeying his standby orders and killing every single fallen he came across. Next to that he demanded lord Shaxx to give him more crucible bounties so he could duke it out with unsuspecting guardians just trying to hone their skills in the competition. He'd rocket launch every single one of them, ignoring their complaints and threathening to shoot them if they said more words. The crucible manager had sighed at the sorry sight and told him to go home. Deji ignored him, ofcourse.

In the midst of it all, Cayde was desperately waiting for the redhead to return. Where Cero had given up, he had put his high hopes.

She'd return with a team, ping him and they'd join them. They would try again. They would stand a chance against the Vex.

"Cayde, you need to rest," Ikora's soft voice was heard from the end of the meeting hall, and he balled his hand into a fist at the map table.

"What if she contacts me? I need to be ready. I'm a robot. I don't need rest," he muttered, taking a swig of his strong alcohol, feeling the burn of it, but that was the only thing, really. 

"You have a thinker that needs to recharge. I'm running night duty. I'll be here, ready like you were for the past two days now," she said, her voice much closer now. He felt a hand on his shoulder, and he slumped.

"Fine. Just make sure you can hear it. Keep it close to you, maybe put it next to your ear-"

"I got it, Cayde," she sighed, and he hesitantly left the big hall, his comm now in the hands of the dark skinned warlock.

-

As soon as the hunter entered his bedroom, he collapsed onto the mattress. He was exhausted. He hadn't slept since the raid, merely showered to get rid of Cero's fuel on his metal body, and that was it for self care. It was surprising Ikora caught on, because the vanguard was running on fumes but acting like everything was fine.

She had eagle eyes. Warlocks were too observing. It was scary.

Speaking of warlocks, Deji-8 had been the center of crucible complaints. Shaxx was dealing with a monster, and Cayde wondered if the crucible manager would ever hear the end of it.

He didn't really have time to think about anything else, because his exhaustion enveloped him to the point where he knocked out.

-

The next morning came with a message of his ghost telling him to meet up with Alric, the only one stable enough out of Parallax to hold a conversation. He sighed, but went to the meeting spot anyway. It was at the hangar, and Alric was wearing a welding mask to protect his face as he designed a new exo arm.

"I never took you to actually make the arms yourself. Thought you got Holliday to do it or something," Cayde mused, and the awoken stopped his work to lift up the mask. He was covered in grease, a large purple paint splatter on his neck and left hand.

"I take lessons from Amanda when I'm in the tower. Got a lot of them when Cero was missing, actually. I wanted to talk to you about my team. They've been.. problematic," Alric scratched his slightly sweaty hair, and placed the mask on top of the arm.

"Only Deji is wreaking havoc in the crucible. Cero is a different case. It's like she shut herself down," Cayde said, sitting down on a sparrow husk.

"I don't know how to approach her since I lost my memories, and Deji refuses to listen to me. I don't know what I did wrong," the awoken muttered, and Cayde felt for the titan. When he woke up and Deji had told him about Ara, all he asked was who she was, and that he didn't remember the supposed raid. Deji had stiffly gotten up and informed Cero, then left to the EDZ. Cayde had found out what happened by visiting Alric himself, and it was honestly one of the most frustrating outcomes of the mission.

"I trust Ara will return. If she does, Cero might become stable again and Deji will stop moping. You didn't do anything wrong, Alric. We just gotta be patient," the vanguard assured him, and Alric gave a weak nod.

"I just wish I was more useful. This whole thing might not have happened if I could just-"

"You aren't the only one with regrets. Take those words to heart and use them to become stronger. You're smart. Anyone else with your style would've died a long time ago. This failure isn't you, or your team's end, titan. Remember that," Cayde smiled, and stood up to flick Alric's nose. The white haired male covered his face in surprise and Cayde laughed.

"Thanks, Cayde," the hunter heard, and he turned around to give a smug bow before heading off.

"I'mma go annoy Ikora. Can you believe she forced me to go to bed last night? I was still working! It's blasphemy," he said loudly, and Alric's laugh echoed through the hangar.

Once he was up the stairs and in the courtyard, he went to the meeting hall to retreive his comm, finding Ikora reading some reports on her hidden agent stuff from the looks of it.

"Hey," he said, and the woman looked up briefly before tossing the tiny communication device his way without a second glance. He clumsily caught it, yelling obsenities at the rough treatment of his delicate equipment.

"You catch everything I throw you. That wouldn't have been any different," she merely said, turning her back to him and continuing her task. Cayde mimicked her, walking to his spot at the meeting table and resuming the idle position he had held for the past two days now.

It was going to be a long day.


	29. Chapter 29

Having a group of more than threehundred people parade behind you , trying to scale a snow covered mountain with winds like it was stolen from a Kushala Daora's wrath proved to be a challenge. What would normally take a hunter an hour to reach, took almost a whole night with the amount of people they were leading.

Ara was exhausted by the time everyone reached the nest, and her tired legs buckled once she entered the well hidden cave with Wonder and a few others from Cathar, if she remembered correctly. She was finally out of the wind, but that wasn't the case for most of the group. They were still outside, the nest being way too small to fit them inside.

"Portal's still up," Wonder mumbled while warming his hands. Ara nodded, a huge weight falling off her shoulders. If she had ended up at the spot Wonder had told her the portal would be at, and it was gone, she would no doubt be called a fraud, or a waste of time.

The thing was big, round and overall creepy looking. She grimaced at it, and turned back to Wonder.

"We're going in, and after that we will catch our breath on Venus. Pass it on," she readied her comm, going to the SOS setting and keeping it in her gloved hand while wonder repeated her words loudly to the group, telling them to pass on the message.

"Let's go," she said loud and clear, receiving a few yells from behind her, and she got ready to run through the portal.

It was like before. Quick, slightly nauseating, but over just as fast. she opened her eyes to find herself, and increasing amounts of hunters on the Shattered Coast. They were a good distance from the Citadel, luckily. She sat down and saw the others follow her movements a bit uncertainly. A girl with dark facepaint ogled the sky, absolutely enarmored by the extreme differences Venus carried in comparison to Wyveria's beautiful sky.

Ara pressed the SOS, seeing the signal arriving without hindrance. Behind her, she heard some kind of 'oompf', a rustle of leaves and a sloppy landing before a mop of ashen hair came into her vision. Wonder looked bewildered, and his hair was in disarray. It was the first time Ara had seen him lose his stoic facial expression.

"Portals are very unreliable," he said, plucking the alien leaf out of his steel plating.

"I just sent the signal to the tower," she stated, ignoring his remark. Her shoulders were tense, and she kept seeing hunters appear out of thin air. It was hard to watch.

"You're doubting yourself, Blazenut," Karma's voice rang through Ara's ears, and she looked up to find the smithy approaching her. Karma always knew what she was thinking. It was slightly offputting, but most of the times it helped with Ara's troubles.

"I just don't want people to die. I know it's inevitable, but to think I'll be the cause of.." she sighed and looked down, not wanting to think about it.

"They're crowns. They should know how to hold a weapon. If not, they signed up for this themselves. It won't be your fault. You only want to save Wyveria," the hazel eyed woman shrugged, and Ara tilted her head.

"What if it was a friend who died? Would you still say the same?"

"Always," she smiled, taking a branch from the ground and breaking it into small pieces. To avoid eye contact, Ara supposed.

"Hey redhead! Last hunter just passed through your creepy little portal thing. What's next?" A gunner with spikey hair said. His face looked a bit smug, and Ara rolled her eyes. He seemed like a bronze crown the way he carried himself. Like he was hot stuff through and through, having been awarded a crown title and flaunting it everywhere he went. Ara remembered her bronze days and how she flocked her position. It made her grimace.

"We shall rest here until the guardians show up. Gods know you could all use it. I advise you get some shut eye since it might very well be your last bit of peace for a long while. This is an intergalactic army we're about to clash with. Our enemy does not sleep," she shouted at the huge crowd, and effectively shut most of them up. Some hunters kept bragging how they'd kill the 'leader' of the Vex, but Ara didn't even know if they had one. She watched the smarter ones use their pouches as a pillow, or a patch of leaves for a less hard surface to sleep on. Mr. Gunner just kinda stared ahead.

The sunkissed girl sighed, standing up and walking over to him. He looked surprised at her sudden movement, but made some space nonetheless.

"You wound up here with a heart in turmoil, right?" She asked, and saw his face fall. No longer did he portray the tough guy.

"My friends, they're gold crowns like you and blondie. I just got crowned, but I barely know what I'm doing out here. I've never even been to Pokke let alone traveled across space to fight a robotic army that might instantly decapitate me and use me for creepy experiments. I made the wrong choice joining my team. I'm not ready," he rambled, his hands beginning to shake. Ara knew too well the expression he wore when he first called her out. Appearing tough, but crumbling inside. She herself had felt like that when she found out her mother's illness might not have a cure. Even so, she kept pushing on, and so should he.

"I don't think anyone on Wyveria would ever be prepared to travel across space for an urgent quest. You know your way around a gun. Maybe one of the guardians can give you a sniper so you can provide backup from a safe distance," Ara suggested, and he tilted his head.

"Think they'd just give their forged goods to a greenhorn like me?"

"From what I see they have so many guns they can use them as back scratchers. I know them, they wouldn't mind at all," Ara smiled when the gunner's face relaxed a little, with it his trembling seizing.

"Thanks, commander. I guess you really are one now since you're leading this skirmish. Good on you," he grinned, this time a sincerity in his words, and she nodded appreciatively.

"Ask Cero or Alric for a safe sniping spot when you get the chance. Cero is a black exo, or robotic humanoid, with purple eyes. Alric has pale blue skin with stark white hair and eyes. Can't miss them, honestly," she smiled and stood to rejoin Wonder and Karma, the two sharing some jerky and cool drinks.

"Here, Ara," Karma said and threw some wrapped food at her. She caught it expertly and sat down, unwrapping the-

"Barroth tail? Really?" She grimaced and heard the smithy laugh at her.

"It's all I had! Take it or leave it, I don't care. Your stomach might, though," Karma shrugged and kept eating her delicious jerky. Ara just sighed and bit into the dry meat. Better than nothing, she supposed.

Soon she'd see Cero again. She wondered how they were doing after all that happened when she left. At least three guardians were wounded, from the quick glance she had. Cero was probably the unluckiest of the bunch, anf it kinda hurt to see her like that. She wasn't like humans, but she could feel pain. It must be hell to see your limbs being teared off, registering the pain a second later and feeling the hopelessness that comes after it all. It was a miracle she didn't scream.

Shaking away the thought, she gazed at the bunched up hunters. Some had pitched up a tent, or some kind of cover. It was cloudy, they were right to make it.

"So tell me more about those guardians," Karma said through her jerky munches, curiosity making her eyes shine despite the moody weather.

"Did you know they're actually dead?" Ara said, taking a swig of her drink. Both Karma and Wonder stopped chewing, a hilarious expression crossing their features.

"You're kidding," Wonder laughed nervously. Ara shook her head no.

"Their sole purpose is to defend.. kind of their god. It's a huge sphere above their city. The thing terraformed all the planets in their solar system. The Traveler, that's the name it's been given, has an enemy called the darkness. That's where guardians come in," Ara explained, taking a bite of the Barroth tail.

"They were resurrected with something called the Traveler's light. It keeps them 'alive'. They have some kind of super power within them, enhancing their abilities. For example, if you had a Dalamadur, a single guardian could probably take it down in a minute with just their light," she stated, and Karma had the audacity to spit out her drink and cover Wonder with the water. He grimaced and immediately cleaned his face.

"So you're telling me we're gonna fight the things guardians have trouble with?" The black haired woman asked, eyes wide.

"It's not strength they're lacking. It's numbers. They can't afford to have a lot of guardians in one spot to abandon another. The enemy would instantly overtake it," the redhead replied and threw the leftover Barroth bone towards a little dirt pile, away from any hunters.

"I'm nervous to meet them," Wonder chuckled, and Ara joined him.

"Me too. I left in a bit of a bad moment. Can't wait to see them again."


	30. Chapter 30

Ara was dead. She couldn't have made it past the portal. It was just impossible.

Ara was dead because Cero wasn't strong enough.

It was all her fault.

Alric lost his memory because Cero wasn't back at his side in time.

Deji was running from the truth, neglecting to see her or Alric because Cero had disgarded him in battle.

It was all Cero's fault.

She was too weak. And because of that, she lost the one person who loved her like she was flesh and bone.

-

Her apartment was dark and messy. Avon and Alric had made sure she came home safely for the night after sitting in the storage unit all day, trying to forget herself.

Cero didn't care where she was anymore. She could just go on standby in the bazaar for all she cared. She was an exo, it wouldn't damage her.

Codex had stopped trying to get her to talk. He knew she wouldn't respond.

"I believe otherwise," was the last thing her ghost told her before transmatting back to his safe space. That was three days ago.

Cero just wanted to wipe her whole memory and become a cleaning frame, bound to stand in a place no one would ever care to visit in the tower.

She shuffled to her bed, dropping on it with a slight huff and closing her eyes, ready to be done with her pointless day.

She'd probably dream about the moment Ara left the cave again, like she had for the past week.

-

Morning came by, and Cero hadn't slept. She chose instead to just stare at the wall, not wanting the awful memory be replayed inside her head. Ara's retreating form, her red hair flowing behind her. The way she confidently left, like she stood a chance.

Cero knew that would be the last time she'd see her.

Thinking back to the short amount of time she spent with the hunter, it was like fireworks. Beautiful while it lasted, and it left a feeling of longing behind. Like wanting to see more, but being unable to.

She just wanted to see Ara's smile again.

She wondered if Alric and Deji felt like this when she went missing. She never really talked about it with them, top priority being the Vex. She'd have to bring it up.

But she was unable to speak. It was like her thinker was blocking her voice. A constant, choked up feeling was stuck inside her.

Was this what crying felt like?

It was described roughly the same.

A knock made her move for the first time in six hours, and she hesitantly stood up from her unmade bed to see who would want to talk to a mute guardian at seven in the morning.

Opening her door, it was Deji. He looked oddly calm, like an actual warlock. Cero stepped aside to let him in, slightly shocked at his sudden appearance, and he entered without a word. His breathing was somewhat heavy, like he had ran across the tower in a hurry.

"You can't speak right now. I know that. Me and 'Ric don't blame you," he started, leaning against Cero's kitchen counter.

So why was he here?

"I wanted to.. talk. About stuff. Your face says enough for me to roughly get what's goin' on up in your thinker. I'm still a warlock, I can sense what you want to say, I suppose. And you're still my leader," he continued, frowning even deeper than he normally would when he spoke.

Cero nodded, trying to hold on to the tiny bit of sanity she had left for her team member.

"Alric lost his memory, but I think it's just blocked by trauma. I said some stuff to him, and he forgot that too. Maybe if he sees Ara again, he'll remember everything," Deji said, coming closer to Cero, who went still at the mention of the person who was haunting her mind.

"I think she's alive, Birdie. We all do. Even the Drifter is curious about her, and thinks shes out there, trying to help us get back at the Vex," the exo male said, placing a hand on her shoulder. He gazed at her for a moment, trying to make out what his leader was thinking exactly.

Cero could hardly believe him. Vex see everything. An invisibility cloak would not just nullify their freaky tech.

"You gotta believe in her. Just like I do. What makes me think she ain't killed herself out there?"

Cero tilted her head slightly, looking at his bright blue eyes expectantly.

"She's smart as hell. Observes everything. Alric told me she learns like a machine, the way she picked up on training. One time I caught her in the tower, she was drawing a photo copy of a vex in her notebook, adding the information she found on it, the shit it was built from and everything, without anyone telling her. She's probably smarter than Ikora, or maybe even Ana Bray," he said, shaking the nightstalker slightly. Cero raised her browplates, a bit shocked at his words. To think that Deji, the guy who was ready to fight Ara, to get her out of the tower as fast as possible, would now put so much trust in that her.

"Give her some credit, leader. Traveler knows she deserves it," the warlock said, and finally pulled her into a hug. Cero closed her eyes, returning the embrace. It was a miracle that Deji was here to try and cheer her up, out of all people, but that just made her appreciate the gesture even more. He was a hothead, but he was a warlock. He knew when to set aside his temper when it was neccessary.

There was also some truth in Deji's words. Ara was smart. Smarter than most guardians. She might've had a plan going through the horde of Vex.

All Cero could do was hope, like her fireteam did when she herself went missing.

She wanted to thank Deji, but her voice was locked away.

Pulling back from the hug, she opened her mouth, desperate for words to come out. Her mouth lit up purple, but it stayed the same brightness, because she wasn't speaking. It was like a snake was wrapped around her, constricting her, and the only way to get rid of the menace was to know if Ara was alive.

"It's okay, Birdie. I know what you wanna say," he smiled, an extremely rare sight for the rusted exo, and he pat her head. She looked down, a bit embarrassed, but didn't stop him.

"Let's go get some breakfast. I head the ramen shop recently started selling hot dogs," he grinned, and Cero nodded, following the red exo.

-

The tower never slept. Guardians didn't need it per se, so a lot of people were around regardless of the time.

Right now, Cero was waiting for Deji to return with the hot dogs. She was sitting at a balcony in one of the upper levels, and gazed at the Traveler. She wondered if it knew the Vex were brewing up a storm.

It had been quiet for ages. No one knew why, not even the Speaker.

Unable to come up with an answer, she sighed and leaned back in the worn chair. Things were okay, still. She just hoped it would stay like that long enough for them to fix the Venus problem.

"I didn't know if you wanted ketchup or whatever, so I got one of both," Deji's static voice reached her, and she looked up. He was holding food in both of his hands, one clumsily slathered in way too much ketchup, and one without anything but the sausage and the bun. Cero chuckled, taking the red monstrosity Deji had created. He sat down next to her, looking up at the giant sphere in the sky.

"Can't believe that thing keeps us alive. Can you?" He asked, taking a big bite of his food. Cero shrugged, also biting in the ketchup mess.

'I wouldn't want to live in a world without it. I wouldn't have met you and Alric and everyone else,' she wanted to say, but instead all she could do was gaze at the warlock. He seemed oddly at peace.

"I have a good feelin' about today, Birdie. I've been trying to train in the crucible with my new arm. That's why I wasn't here a lot. My arm now has built in sticky grenades, so I just load it up and slap a bitch, then boom," he said, holding up his new arm with a grin. It had a pretty minimalistic design, the red coat of paint shining under the sun. Cero took his hand, looking at his palm and finding it hollow.

"It's a certain movement I have to do with my fingers to trigger a grenade to eject. I bet 'Ric's gonna go nuts over it," he mused, and Cero rolled her eyes with a smile.

They enjoyed the rest of their food, looking at ships flying in and out of the tower and guardians running from a to b. Everyone had their own mission, station or bounty. It was just the Venus involved people who were on standby. Zavala and Cayde had told everyone to be ready. Around fourty guardians were ready to join forces with Ara, if she were ever to return. All of them would launch a head on attack to get into the Citadel to find the secret. It was honestly making Cero nervous. Not even the Infinite Forest was guarded this well, and it was one of the primary Vex sources of operations. To have one place so heavily guarded not even a raid team could get in was worrying.

"I'm gonna go check on 'Ric. Haven't seen him since he woke up," Deji said a bit awkwardly. It was true he left in a hurry, but no one knew why exactly.

"Had to leave 'cuz I thought I'd say shit I would regret like I did a few days before the raid. I ended up hurting his feelings," he continued, summoning a small gathering of light above his palm, looking at it.

"I don't wanna see him all panicky again, so before I could run my mouth I figured it was best to clear my head and stuff."

Cero watched him, somewhat happy that he decided to do that. Alric was confused at most, just wondering why Deji ran off. He found out later that he had actually suffered amnesia after talking to Avon.

"I'll talk to you later, don't go catching dust after I leave," he said finally, standing up and waving. He took off, jumping from the balcony and landing with his hovering jump like he was a feather in the wind. Cero watched him disappear behind a wall and sighed. Don't go catching dust, he said.

What the hell was she supposed to do? She was unable to do any missions due to the standby.

Maybe she'd go and visit the Drifter, play some cards.

Having made up her mind fairly quick, she also jumped down the balcony and landed without a sound, going to the Drifter's tiny work space next to the ramen shop.

When she slid under the partially closed garage door, she saw him sleep rather unattractively with his mouth open on his chair. She came closer, poking him carefully in the chest. He shot awake, grabbing Cero's hand painfully hard and glaring at her before softening his features.

"If it isn't our mute sister. What can the Drifter do for ya?" He asked, yawning slightly. Cero retracted her hand from his grasp, and pointed at his stack of cards. He looked over, taking the deck and shuffling it like he probably had hundreds of times already.

"A game of cards? Sure. But you gotta bet something. It's more fun that way," he said with a sly smile, and she rolled her eyes, fishing some Glimmer from her pocket.

"Now hold just a moment. We need a proper table for cards. How about we head to my hideout for a second?" He asked, and Cero shrugged, not really caring.

-

"That's the fifth time you freakin' won! You're a void user, but by far the sneakiest one I've met," he yelled, eyes wide. The table was filled with cards and items, Cero was holding a winning hand, and the drifter was getting shitfaced with alcohol and somehow they had resorted to strip poker. He was in his socks and boxers, and she was fully clothed in her armor and unable to stop laughing and sputtering at the sorry display of the usual scary man. He was annoyed, and also couldn't deal with loss. That much was clear.

"One more round. If you play my socks off you officially win," he slurred, poking his index finger at her forehead twice. She nodded and dealt the cards for them both.

After a while, Drifter called an all in on his Glimmer, and Cero frowned.

Was he bluffing? He seemed like the type. Cero's hand wasn't bad, but it also wasn't anything flashy. If he called all in, he was basically certain of winning.

She huffed, not about to let up. Betting the same amount, they both revealed their cards and as expected, the Drifter won.

She leaned back in defeat, taking off her cloak and throwing it at the man. He was celebrating loudly, and Cero laughed at his words.

They continued talking for a while, well, Drifter continued saying things to her and she occasionally nodded, the mysterious card fanatic dressing himself clumsily and Cero shuffling his cards absent mindedly. She wondered how much time had passed, and checked her tracker. The thing showed it was 3:18pm, that meant she had spent around 8 hours in the hideout just playing cards and listening to his many stories.

He had talked for more than eight hours, but Cero still didn't know a single thing about him. He was a strange man, meddling in strange elements. All she hoped for was that he knew what he was doing.

"Shouldn't you take that?" He wondered, pointing at her holo display.

It was Cayde-6 trying to reach her, and she quickly accepted the comm talk, her face tensing up.

"Where in Traveler's grace are you? Nevermind that. Get to the tower, I need to talk to you," he said, and the comm went dead just like that. What could he mean? Was it related to Venus? It must be. He would've called Alric otherwise, him being the most reliable with anything unrelated to the green planet at the moment.

She glanced at the Drifter, and he already shoo'ed her away.

Not wasting any time, she went to her ship and returned to the tower.

-

It was 4pm when she arrived, and Alric and Deji were waiting for her at the hangar. It seems they had talked, the both of them standing close as they greeted her. She felt bad, not being able to talk, but she knew they didn't blame her.

Cero's fireteam, as dysfunctional as it may be at times, was what kept her grounded. The guy that she happened to bump into stuck to her for the rest of her guardian days, and the half bodied warlock on the moon, unable to work with anyone, miraculously joined the two of them like it was his destiny.

Deji and Alric were her pillars. She'd have been far worse off than not being able to talk if it weren't for them supporting her through this.

She smiled warmly at them, and they all three went to the meeting hall, wondering just what Cayde needed them for.

It was a dreadful feeling, and they all knew it had to do with Venus if Parallax was requested.

The meeting hall was incredibly busy, over fourty guardians gathered in the room. Cayde was standing on the map table, throwing up a hand when he noticed Cero and her team joining the fray.

"Wonder what this is," Deji said through the noise, and Alric frowned slightly.

"These guardians were all stationed on Venus. I think I know what's going to happen," he replied to the warlock, who shrugged in return. Cero just observed the whole thing.

"About a month ago, a mortal from another planet came to the tower, having saved a guardian from dying in an unknown world. That same mortal went on a raid, the infamous Venus failure, where even a member of the vanguard among skilled guardians wasn't enough to secure passage to the secrets of the Citadel," he said, and the room was quiet. Everyone was looking at him, anticipating.

"The mortal promised to return with help after we got injured in a terrifying battle against the Vex. Remember every Vex you defeated. Then multiply that tenfold, and that's what we were dealing with. My supers barely scratched the gatekeepers. Ara was gone, and all she had was an invisibilty cloak and a sword to fight the army. She went off our radar for a good two weeks," the exo continued, taking off the tracker from his wrist, holding it up.

What showed, was a giant white blotch of unknown radar activity in the shattered coast, and an SOS signal. Cero's eyes widened, and guardians around her gasped in disbelief.

"Thirty minutes ago I received an SOS from Ara's tracker. The unknown dots are hunters from her planet ready to kill anything that guards the Citadel. They have come to help us. Even though they don't know us, our planet, or our reason for fighting, they trusted the one mortal that saved our guardian. and it is our job, as fellow guardians, to repay her kindness by keeping the help we get alive. Do anything you can, use anything at your disposal to heal injured hunters. You are not just holding a gun today, you are holding the life of someone else in your hands," he finished, stepping off the table and holding up his ghost.

"Get to the hangar everyone! We're gonna be doctors today!" A random guardian shouted, and the roars she received rang through Cero's ears.

Ara was alive. And she brought her own version of an army.

The Vex were going to wish they stayed scrap metal.


	31. Chapter 31

The time passed quickly, and before long a few hunters started to point at the sky.

Ships arrived in a formation resembling a flock of birds, and the leading ship was Cayde's. Behind him was Cero and Deji, their ships easily recognizable even with the yellow hue Venus embodied them in. More and more ships came into clear sight, and counting them, Ara noticed there were over fourty in total.

Fourty lightbearers with threehundred hunters. Given the damage just five guardians did to an army of thousands of Vex, they stood a chance.

She ran to the landing point and almost bumped into a random titan that transmatted to the ground. He smiled and patted her roughly on the shoulder before taking off to say hello to some awestruck hunters.

She looked around, trying to find the small guardian that made her life so much more interesting than before, and landed her eyes on a red painted warlock speaking to a titan wearing his helmet. She approached them.

"Deji?" She spoke up, and both of them turned to her. She saw Deji's mouth fall open, and he stepped aside to show Cero frozen in place. She was hidden behind the two men, hence why she didn't see her. She looked good, healthy. She had her limbs back as if they were never torn off, as if she was never laying in a pool of her own fuel.

"Cero!" Ara cried, running up to her, lifting her up in her arms and kissing her cheek, getting a surprised gasp from the nightstalker.

"I missed you," Cero managed to croak out in the redhead's tight embrace.

"I was so worried, is everyone okay?" Ara asked, and the smaller girl stayed quiet. Ara noticed her body tense up and she let her go, making sure she stood back on the ground safely. The purple eyed guardian wasn't looking her in the eyes. Something was wrong.

"Alric lost his memory of you and the mission, and it hasn't returned yet," Deji spoke up, and Ara's eyes shot towards the titan standing next to Deji. So that was Alric after all.

"You got hit pretty hard, it's nothing I can hold against you," Ara walked up to him, removing the metal from his head and seeing just how tired the awoken looked.

"You aren't mad?" His ghost, Flux, translated his words. She too seemed apologetic, barely moving as she talked. Ara rolled her eyes, lightly shoving his arm. 

"You really think that getting memory loss is something I'll get upset about? I got a Poogie at home that forgets I'm his caretaker all the time. I don't know about Earth but in my Wyveria we just do this," she said, holding out her hand promptly.

Alric looked at her a bit confused, but grabbed her hand anyway, albeit a bit hesitant. As soon as he did, the redhead bowed, and looked up at him with a wide smile.

"Crowned hunter of the Capital C and protector of Dundorma, Ara, at your service. I hope me and my people will be of some help in uncovering the secrets of the Citadel," she said and shook it once before letting go. Alric gazed at her, dumbfounded. Then he just blushed a lot and turned to bury his face into Deji's chest, causing said warlock to wrap an arm around him and say some words of comfort to him.

"Ara", Cero spoke from behind her, and she jumped in surprise. Turning, the redhead frowned at the guardian. She was sneakier than a bow user, and it always caught Ara off guard.

"Right, the plan," she said, dragging the nightstalker along to a patch of rocks. She sat down, placing her blade in front of her. Cero gazed at the hilt and let a smile ghost her face. Ofcourse Ara had never removed the black fabric. It was one of the things that gave her a sense of calm in the midst of the Vex while she was in the caves.

"Where's Cayde?" The taller girl asked, and felt a hand on her shoulder. She jumped for the second time and immediately turned to see Cayde-6 grin at her.

"Knew you'd come back, girl," he said, and Ara huffed.

"You could've said that without giving me a heart attack first," she muttered and sat down, unfolding some notes and a map quite crudely drawn for her standards. Wonder wasn't the best artist. She'd told him to copy Venus from her tracker, but it was a disaster. At least it still made out the important parts.

She didn't beat around the bush. It was straight into strategizing from here.

"Since we are with such a huge group, we can't take any detours. I've figured out a formation which is best suited for the weapons we use. If the guardians circle around us, inside the formation or perhaps even above us, we can keep my people without too much harm. The blademaster's armor is made of heavy steel and Wyvern bone, they should be able to take a few hits. The gunners aren't as sturdy, for they have to move around a lot. Gunners will be standing on the sides, and bow users at the back. If we can increase guardian numbers there it would be great," she explained, and Cero hummed.

"I'm impressed, strawberry. We know were gonna play doctor today, but I didn't tell you anything about that yet," Cayde spoke up, and Ara giggled softly.

"The thing with our light's healing ability is that if our ghost gets hit and it dies, we're done for. We can't let our ghosts heal immediately in combat. The warlocks will linger around creating healing wells, titans will make rally barricades and pop their sentinel shields and hunters will scoop up critically injured people and heal them at a safe spot while covering them both in invisibility smoke. It's the best plan we can have regarding both of our group's safety," Cero explained, summoning Codex. He looked at Ara for a bit, and began happily twirling his shell, approaching her.

"We couldn't heal our guardians during the raid. We also can't replace body parts. It was a very grim situation for all of us, but I'm glad you made it back, Ara," Codex said, nuzzling against her cheek before returning to his Cero's hand, landing onto her palm.

"I'll go and inform everyone we're leaving. How about we have campus 9 as the base for hunters to heal mortals?" Cayde suggested, and both girls nodded. It wasn't much of a stretch given the mobility of a hunter, and hostile activity was never that big there.

"Make sure you yell loudly. Some veterans have hearing problems due to monster roars," Ara informed the vanguard, and he gave a thumbs up as he walked towards a tree, climbing on top of it.

"Listen up everyone!" He yelled in Wyverian, catching the attention of most people.

"We're about to head straight for the Citadel, so if you need anything done before that I suggest you don't because we ain't got time. If you get injured to point you can't fight, yell the word 'Guardian' and one of us caped hero's will scoop you up and bring you to a safe spot. Kind of. Just don't get hit and you'll be fine," he said, getting a few confused glances his way. Ara's people started whispering amongst eachother, and the guardians seemed to have dealt with this sort of "speech" from Cayde many times already, seeing as they only sighed.

"We're going that way!" The exo vanguard pointed to the Ishtar Cliffs, and the sound of people grabbing their things and gearing up filled the air. Ara saw Parallax waiting for everyone so they could lead the giant group, and once everyone was ready, they all started their walk towards the Citadel.

Alric was in the lead once more, she thought.

Taking this chance, she joined the titan, Deji stepping back a few paces to talk to Cero, so Ara could have a moment with the awoken.

"I'm afraid I'm gonna have to use my weapons," Alric said, barely audible over the crowd behind them.

"I don't think that's going to be the case, judging from what I've seen you do. Sure you got hit, but that was because we got overpowered. It's different now," Ara assured him, and he nodded. He was holding a gun, but his hand was off the trigger.

"What Cero said to you was the first thing she uttered in two weeks, according to Holliday," the awoken spoke, changing the subject.

"Really?" Ara's eyes widened ever so slightly, and Alric smiled.

"She thought you were dead, and she blamed herself. For the whole thing really. She thought she wasn't strong enough."

Ara turned her head back, gazing at Cero who was talking to Deji. She seemed okay now, but to think she beat herself up so much over something that wasn't even her fault.. Ara wished she was there to comfort her back then. To hold her until she slept without worries. It wouldn't be possible, not since she was a guardian, but it was a nice wish. 

"We're approaching the Waking Ruins! After this we will see the Citadel, be ready!" Alric said loudly, pulling her back from her thoughts.

The ruins were eerie, but what was beyond it was even worse. She wondered how her hunters would react. She had described it to some people, but they barely believed her. All they did was scoff at her words.

The Waking Ruins were quiet, just like the time during the raid.

The Vex were waiting for them.


	32. Chapter 32

The Citadel was partly covered by a dark, looming cloud. It shed lightning onto the structure, connecting with the spires and around it. Vines were climbing up the metal walls, partially dead due to the constant electric currents running through it. The floating ruins around it were otherworldly like it's creators, darkness coursing through and through. It looked grim, and no guardian had ever set foot inside. It was deemed to be abandoned like the ruins of the Ishtar Academy.

Oh, how wrong they were.

Right under their noses the Vex were keeping a secret as easily as an adult human playing a prank on an oblivious child. It was almost funny.

Cero peered through her scope, her mechanical eyes further enhancing her zoom and seeing a lone goblin stand outside the entryway of the Citadel. The thing looked like a statue, looking up at the sky as if it wasn't the cause of humanity's misery. She wanted to smash its head in like she'd done to many bugs in the EDZ. It's what they deserved after everything they've destroyed.

"Are you ready?" She asked Ara, the redhead nodding her head without hesitance. Her hair was in her signature twintails, thunder clips matching the grim weather. She wondered where Ara got the accessory. Maybe she'd ask her after all this was over.

"Everybody get in position!" The blademaster cried loudly, her usually kind eyes set sharp and stern for the battle to come. Hunters moved in disarray, into the formation optimal to battle the soulless robotic enemies.

"Guardians, take your post!" Cayde yelled just as loud, and the lightbearers took to the skies to jump to their designated spots. Rain started to fall, droplets making a soft clinking sound on the armor of many, and Cero hoped the weather wouldn't affect the fight. It seemed to be a harmless drizzle, but knowing the unpredictable clouds on Venus, she feared the worst. They moved closer and closer to the large, alien structure, and it was like a spark that caused the huge fire to erupt from nothingness. Hydra's and Cyclopses spawned in, immediately charging their shots. Titans popped their Sentinel shields, creating a large barrier around the group. Charge bladers ran forward with their own shields up, striking down the hostile forces. Goblins and Hobgoblins appeared in dozens, hundreds even, and soon it rained arrows expertly piercing the cores of their bodies. They exploded, some Hobgoblins activating their regeneration. They got a taste of dual bladers slicing them and cutting them into tiny pieces before they healed enough to continue their onslaught.

"They're a lot less sturdy than monsters," a longsword user mused at Cero's side, and someone chuckled at his remark. It was true, they were, but it wasn't their strength.

It was their numbers.

Their army had already grown twice in size the last time Cero saw them during the raid, and it hadn't even been ten minutes. Warlocks were using their healing rifts and wells, making sure bullets got negated, but the wave of lazers and bullets got so overpowering it was like looking at a red hailstorm. Nightstalkers got the idea to weed out the small enemies by shooting their void arrows in a line, Cero joining in. She shot her arrow straight through a Gatekeeper, the void tether stuck in its head.

"Eat shit," she spat, and tapped her Crimson several times. A shower of bullets dove into the Gatekeeper's core, damage going through to all enemies surrounding the high class target. They withered away in void light, nothing left. She switched to her secondary weapon, her Ikelos shotgun, and shot a hobgoblin at point blank, the thing trying and failing to get a sword and shield user while his back was turned to help another hunter with the same weapon.

The battle raged on, more and more Vex teleporting to the massive army and getting tethered by the nightstalkers. The light was strong, but their enemy already marched closer to the gunners, and soon a blood curdling scream was heard by a light bowgunner, her arm being torn off by a minotaur. Blood flew into the air, covering her heavy bowgun companion as he watched in terror, his grey eyes trembling. The girl fell to the ground right at his feet, crying in pain. A switch axer swept by, impaling the minotaur with with his massive weapon and gone just as quick. The heavy bowgunner pulled up his shield, repeating 'guardian' as loud as he could with a thick accent, and protected his friend with his gigantic gun while he waited for help. It was the only thing he could do, the goblins firing merciless lazers at him so fast he couldn't turn to look at his bleeding friend.

A hunter jumped to her side after a few seconds, grabbing her spasming body and leaving the battlefield to head for Campus 9. Cero noticed the heavy bowgunners shoulders relax ever so slightly, and he continued his fight.

"'Ric! How's the entry looking?" The parallax leader asked through her comm, and a slight static was heard before Alric's strained voice came through.

"We're steadily breaching their defenses on the left side! I've got a clear path into the Citadel!" The titan grunted, yelling at a warlock to throw his nova bomb into the sea of Vex.

"Take your team and go! Bring the redhead with you, we'll hold them off!" Cayde yelled, and Cero ran towards her teammate while evading fire from the Vex the moment she got her order. Alric was protecting three warlocks and a bunch of chargebladers, and he looked to be exhausted already, his helmet gone and a burn on his right temple. It seemed like the attack burned through his helmet.

"Where's Deji?" Cero asked quickly as she hid behind one of his barricades, reloading her handcannon. Alric pointed a ways right, and saw Deji holding Ara's arm as they ran towards both of them, the redhead using her Rimeblade to block a stray bullet headed their way. She had a wound on her head as well, the blood trickling into her eye and giving her a somewhat eerie look.

"Let's go, we don't have much time," Alric grit out, taking out his sentinel shield to withstand oncoming fire for the entire team. Deji slammed down one last healing rift for the hunters before loading up his rocket launcher and firing it in front of them, clearing the way from any Goblins.

They sprinted towards the large entrance, Cero throwing a smoke bomb that cloaked them invisible for a good ten seconds, and they quietly went inside the Citadel. It was void of any Vex, but they all knew it was just another trap. It was dark and cold, like some kind of crypt. The nightstalker noticed Alric's ragged breath was visible, creating puffs of air as he leaned against a freakish wall and allowed himself to catch his breath. Deji shoved some water in his hands and the titan didn't waste any time before gulping it down.

"We gotta be ready for whatever's in there," Cero said, but even she herself didn't feel confident. Her resolve was easily broken after she presumed Ara to be dead, only recently being able to return to her former self. It would be bad for everyone if she lost it. She wasn't a fireteam leader for nothing.

"Fight for your people, no matter what happens in here," she said, and Ara, Deji, and Alric all nodded at her with steeled faces.

They were ready. Cero wished she was as brave as them.

-

Signal dropped not long after they reached the Citadel. Pathways led downwards, with drops impossible for mortals to make. Ara had to keep holding on to Deji or Alric in order not to fall to her death, and soon they found themselves in front of a locked door.

"Well, guess that was to be expected," Deji sighed. He pulled up Mainframe, trying to see if there was any way his ghost could hack the lock, but there were no records of the Vex using something like this. The door was massive, like the rest of the Citadel. Strange markings like Hive locks covered the whole door, and a smaller slab of stone was crudely placed next to the door, like it was done in a hurry unlike the rest of the door.

"Futile. We're stuck," Deji's ghost said finally and disappeared again.

"Now what," Alric shrugged, looking around. The other guardians did the same, trying to find some kind of clue but failing. The door was placed like a dent in the bottomless pit they jumped down. Nothing around them showed anything except the alien structure Vex were known to build. The space they stood on was scarce, not even allowing a meter between the door and certain death.

"Can I see it?" Ara asked, and Deji stepped away from the lock immediately, allowing her to approach the massive door. She was quiet for a while. Her grey eyes were skimming over the stone slab, reading the symbols.

She reached out, gloved hand hovering over the lines. They lit up after she traced a specific pattern, and a loud click was heard before the door opened.

"How'd you crack it?" Deji asked, not really believing the fact a human outsmarted an exo warlock.

"It's ancient Wyverian. It told a riddle about a Rathalos, but I don't know why the Vex would use this of all things as a lock," she frowned slightly, and Cero stepped inside the room. The group huddled together, not being able to see anything in the frigid, dark room.

Codex lit up, his light flashing into the darkness...

What they laid eyes upon was by far the most sickening thing any enemy of humanity had done.

No hive ritual came close to this. Not even Savathûn's guardian sacrifices came close to what they just witnessed.

Cero's eyes widened, unable to fathom the sick reason just why the Vex opened a portal to Wyveria.

In front of them, heaps of rotting dead wyverns from Ara's world were mixed with Vex technology, trying to turn them into weapons. Wires were inserted into their bodies, eyes were taken out and replaced with artificial ones. Wings were cut off and replaced with metal. A lone, live Rathalos was at the front, his head following their movement, or rather lack thereof. He was strapped up to all kinds of tubes, even going inside his throat. One of his eyes was gone, replaced with a sickening red glare just like the one Deji had when he lost his temper.

You could feel his plea for death.

Cero heard a clang of metal, a few footsteps and then a tumble.

It was Ara, tears streaming down her dirty, blood stained face.

"No," she shook her head, her hand covering her mouth.

"No," she whimpered again, trying to back away from what she saw.

"Rathalos, the riddle's answer was King. He's the king of the sky. They reduced our pride into a sick experiment," Ara's hands went from her mouth to her hair, pulling at the matted locks. "The Vex knew I'd open the door. They let us in here on purpose," Ara managed through her sobs, and Cero kneeled down before her to force her eyes anywhere but the monster.

"Nevermind that. We gotta put the Rathalos out of his misery," Deji looked at Cero, asking permission silently. The nightstalker just nodded, not trusting her voice.

She watched Deji walk up to the Rathalos, the mangled beast gazing at the rusted warlock as if it was an old friend.

"There's no way I can bring him back from this," he stated, observing the wires and modifications done to the monster. The tubes were pumping some strange, luminescent liquid resembling Vex acid inside the monster.

The Rathalos gave a low grumble, and opened his mouth slowly. An item dropped in front of Deji's feet, and the warlock reluctantly picked it up. It was a rolled up stack of paper covered in saliva. He looked down at the paper, and his eyes noticed something else. It was a silk ribbon, torn but still carrying some of its purple colour. It was tied around one of the Rathalos' legs.

The red wyvern closed his mouth and looked at the warlock's holster as if telling him to just hurry it up already.

Deji tried to think of a way. He really did, but the damage done to the beast was beyond anything he ever saw. It was a miracle the monster was still alive.

Deciding it was futile, he pulled out his Midnight Coup, a weapon he rarely used, deeming it too beautiful to use on unworthy scum. The exo gently placed it on the Rathalos' head and the Wyvern never wavered. When Deji made sure Ara wasn't looking, he shot his single bullet into the beast and watched with a sour expression as the monster closed it's eye and fell down limp, right infront of the warlock. Cero looked back at Ara who was now crying openly. The nightstalker hugged her, the redhead unable to control her voice as she tightly held onto the exo girl. It was weird. Ara was a hunter, she killed monsters too, but she also seemed to deeply care about those same creatures.

Cero remembered a conversation with Ara's felyne friend from a while back, when she was still stuck in Wyveria, about how hunters only hunted monsters who threathened humanity or ecology. Monsters were part of nature. To have the thing you fight for so valiantly being ruined beyond anything imaginable reminded her of humanities war against the darkness. The hunters were like guardians. Nature like humanity.

"It's okay now, he's not in pain anymore," she whispered. Ara nodded, trying desperately to steady her breath.

They had to find the reason behind all this. The only likely thing that could command all the Vex was a Hive Mind. Yet nothing ever recorded in all the time the Traveler was on Earth even remotely resembled what was happening to them. They were deep in the core of the Citadel, but it looked to be a dead end.

"Is there anything we might've missed?" Cero vaguely heard Alric ask, and Deji said something back, but her mind was on Ara's somber face.

"Hey, look at me," she whispered, and those grey eyes, normally shining with life and pride, dully looked up at Cero's own.

"Don't give up now, everyone's still fighting on the surface, Ara. We can finish this together, okay?" the exo placed a hand on Ara's blood covered cheek, and the redhead leaned into it, closing her eyes. She could feel the blademaster's cold breath on her own metal face, and she was once again reminded of what she really was.

Deciding to push away those useless thoughts, and stood, pulling the taller girl with her. Ara stumbled, a bit taken aback by the sudden move, but she smiled. Even if it was forced, Cero appreciated her attempt to cease the exo's worries.

"Cero, Ara. Come here for a sec," Alric called them, and Cero's ears made her turn her head towards one of the less gruesome corners of the room. It was lit up, Deji having literally transmatted a table and a chair to look at something. She didn't know what.

Approaching the two men, she noticed it was a map.

"It's the Citadel. There's a passage hidden by the dead bodies right over there, and if we follow the corridors we'll end up at another massive room. It's three times bigger than this shitty place," Deji explained, tracing the path to one of many squares and tapping on the biggest. Cero saw the map consisted of several smaller ones, some torn pieces and layers of floors.

"Where did you get this? It's hand drawn. No one in our solar system maps out enemy territory this detailed with a pen and paper," Cero narrowed her eyes at the table, and after a good five seconds it clicked. The notes were Wyverian. She got so used to the language she didn't think twice about it.

"The Rathalos spat it out. He had a purple ribbon on his leg. 'Dunno what that means though," he shrugged, rolling up the complex map and pulling back the table and chair into his inventory.

"That Rathalos was a rider's companion," Ara said from behind Cero, and the guardians looked at her, confused by what she meant.

"Riders and monsters share a special bond. They raise the monster from birth. We barely speak with them since we have different beliefs. They live seperated from society, usually in densely forrested areas," the redhead elaborated as she walked towards the pile of bodies, Codex acting as her light source.

"What are you doing?" Deji asked, and Cero watched the way she moved monster's legs and necks.

"They're all from riders," she turned to them, her tears forming again. Cero ran up to her, trying to comfort her once more. This time, she didn't sob. She carried a look of hatred.

"Those riders, they live in villages. What if the Vex raided them and abducted the monsters?" Alric said quietly.

"It's possible. It could also explain why this one rider mapped out the place. Maybe she wanted to return the monsters," Cero sighed, wondering where the rider had ended up. Their Rathalos had been captured. She couldn't imagine them being alive.

"Let's just follow the map for now. See where we end up," Deji concluded, and started to work on the pile of dead monsters while Ara just stared ahead.


	33. Chapter 33

"You're awake!"

"..."

"Is anything wrong? Does something hurt? I think I resurrected you correctly."

"..."

"Not very talkative, are you? We need to get you to a safe place. Fallen are scavenging this coast, so let's go quickly before they find us."

"..."

"You're not standing.. is there something wrong after all?"

"..."

"You seem to be okay according to my scans. I know everything might not make sense now, but if you want to survive, you need to move."

-

"It's the black ghost, he has a guardian now."

"Yes, I do! She's not much of a talker, but she's very capable."

"Take her to Banshee, maybe her vocal settings are messed up."

"He's the gunsmith, right? Thanks!"

-

"Little ghost, I think you have more than her voice to worry about."

"Why's that?"

"She's like a blank slate. No code. Just a bunch or zero's. Look."

"You're right. That's a bit strange. Her thinker still works normally according to all the data I received upon the resurrection."

"Yeah, but she needs more than that to live. Without her code she shouldn't be able to even lift a finger. She'd just be paralyzed all over."

"So you're saying her being well is impossible?"

"That's what data pads on exo say. Not me."

"What shall we do about her voice?"

"Give it time."

-

"It's been two weeks. You still don't feel like talking?"

"..."

"Guess not."

-

"Excuse me, you're that mute exo, right? There's been a report of a lost sector recently reclaimed by a Cabal Champion. We need you to take it out."

"On it. Please don't call her that, though. She's every bit as much a guardian as someone else."

"I'm sorry, I'll be careful next time."

"Thank you. I'm sure command won't have to worry about this sector much longer."

-  
Log #70

She still won't speak. Since I found her in old Spain, Cayde-6 decided to call her Cero-0. It means zero in old Spanish. He told me it might as well be her name since it's her entire code.

-

"I found a forum with a bunch of music from before the golden age. It's always so quiet when we're alone. Do you want me to put on a song?"

"..."

"I've got a few selections here, just pick one you like."

"..."

"Now playing Elvis Presley's Can't Help Falling In Love With You."

-

Log #180

It's been a few days shy of six months. Banshee-44 told me to stop worrying about it, but I fear my guardian will never speak. Next to that, people are spreading rumours that she is held together by darkness. I just hope she won't hear them, but since I can, she probably can as well.

Log #182

A titan and my guardian bumped into eachother yesterday. He began to apologize profusely, and when he noticed one of Cero's antennae got broken upon the impact, he was a few breaths shy of crying. It was a miracle, as he was the cause that made her speak.

"It's fine."

That's what she said. I'm proud of my guardian. She isn't a mute after all. This will definetly help in future missions. Maybe others will see her for the guardian she is, not for the persona the rumours have created for her.

-

"Leave me alone," Cero sighed as she was peering through her scope. Patrolling the EDZ was boring, but to have a chatterbox next to you when you're trying to stay undetected was just plain annoying. He was telling how the farm had begun to help kids learn about animals or whatever.

"I'm sorry, I just thought maybe we could talk about our next move," the white haired awoken said with a shy smile.

"'Our' move?"

"Yes! I'll be your shield," he said, and Cero groaned in annoyance.

"Go back to command."

"I can't, I'm also stationed in the EDZ."

"I don't care."

"Atleast give me a chance, I'm sure I can be useful to you," the titan kept pushing, and Cero had enough. She stood up, put her sniper on her back and hightailed it out of the hilly area she had been trying to scout out. She sighed when she heard the guy follow her footsteps.

-

"Why do you distance yourself from a potential fireteam member?"

"He'll just get in my way."

"I doubt it, Cero."

"He looks clumsy for a titan. He is too innocent and naïve. He will leave once he hears the rumors about me."

"He's on standby in the hangar, possibly waiting for you."

"Let him wait."

-

Log #196

Cero is slowly warming up to the white haired awoken. He hasn't said his name yet. He is waiting for her to ask. His ghost has been sending me messages regarding his goal. He does not shoot, and needs a somewhat reckless guardian to protect so they can make eachother stronger. Cero is pretty reckless, but she clears her flaws with her impeccable stealth. I wonder how this is going to turn out.

-

"Go home."

"I've started to interpret that as hello," the titan said, jumping up in the same tree and sitting down. Cero wanted nothing more than peace and quiet as she listened to the birds chirp and sing, and the fact her ghost kept encouraging her to work together with the titan was starting to really get on her nerves.

"Why do you try so hard?" Cero asked, and the titan smiled.

"No one else will accept me."

"I didn't-" she opened her eyes for the first time since she sat on the tree, scanning his face. He looked sad despite smiling, and she stopped herself from speaking.

"One guardian even shot me. Said I'd never be a true defender of the city. But I think I can make you stronger, Cero, so give me a chance. Use me, because no one else will."

Cero's breath hitched, and she wondered just how much secrets the titan was hiding beneath the happy act he put up.

"Your name." She whispered.

"What?" The awoken looked at her, slightly tilting his head. The sun captured his ghostly skin as if it was white as his hair. He looked like what old books would describe as angelic. For the first time since meeting him, she gazed at him as another person. Not just a pawn for a pointless war.

"What's your name? You know mine."

"It's Alric!" He said, and a bright smile appeared on his flawless face.

-

Log #211

Cero and Alric had been deployed to the moon two days ago. There, an odd signal was found near the entrance of the Hellmouth. Emitting in disturbed radiowaves. Alric took away the rubble, and revealed there to be a warlock with his lower body missing.

He briefly woke up to cough at them that a Servitor had been jamming his tracker, making him unable to call for help.

Cero commanded Alric to return the warlock to the tower for maintenance while she hunted down the Servitor.

Log #214

It took her two days and 3 hours to find the Servitor. It was hidden in the depths of the Hellmouth, just waiting for her. It knew it was being hunted.

Upon return, we heard Alric's voice. It was raised beyond his normal volume, and we wondered why in the world he was angry.

Turned out that the warlock didn't 'need' saving. As he was clearly fine. Alric didn't like that, when the exo had clearly needed him and Cero for survival.

"You shoulda just let me rot. Would've liked that better than knowing I got saved by a guy who lives in his own little bubble."

Which caused Alric to slap the warlock across his metal cheek. Last I know he stormed off to his apartment, passing Cero without a word.

-

"I don't want him in our fireteam."

"I didn't want you in my fireteam either, and now look at us."

"He's dangerous."

"He's a danger to himself. I want him to realize there's more to live for than hunting down every single Hive."

"I think the hive made him crazy. Like Eris."

"Give him a chance. I gave you one too, remember?"

"Fine. I'll try."

-

"I don't need a damn fireteam. Especially not one with mr. Peace-treaty over there."

"We'll be stationed on the moon near your location. I think it's better for humanity if we work together. A warlock is stronger with more people around him."

"Load of bullshit. I survived just fine."

"I carried your damn torso to the ship. You were barely alive. You don't deserve your ghost."

"The fuck did you just say you shitty smurf? I'll tear those freaky eyes out of your-"

"Shut up. Both of you. Join the fireteam, or I will tell command that you just threathened your own kind."

"For a tiny hunter you sure are a big bitch."

"Let's go."

-

He was absolutely exhausting to be around. Cero wondered why she still allowed him near Alric. The two were only good for stirring up a room and causing enemies to tear them both down.

But it was the cold, sad look Deji held when Alric first hit him across the face. He didn't retaliate. Just accepted it like it was his punishment. It turned her gears.

Maybe he was distancing himself from everybody else because he thought he himself wasn't worthy of being a guardian.

It also explained why he got so riled up when Alric told him Deji didn't deserve his ghost.

"I could feed you to the Warbeasts. I heard awoken meat's their favourite. Filled with darkness and light alike. Freaks.", Deji-8, that was his name, said while stepping on a Hive worm. He was just looking for a fight, and Alric took the bait every. Single. Time.

"I will reduce you to a heap of scrap metal if you continue to talk like you're more than me. It'll be the first blood on my hands since my rebirth and I won't even regret it," the white haired titan retaliated, and Cero rolled her eyes.

"Shut up, girls. We got a mission to finish," she sighed, and heard a gun being reloaded very, very close to her. She jumped back to see Deji pointing his Midnight Coup straight at her, and she gazed at him for a while. He had warped behind her the instant she mocked them.

"Dare shoot it, warlock."

He didn't get a chance to, as a barrier was already formed in front of her. Alric was seething, she could feel it from beside her.

Deji put his gun back in his holster, and walked downwards as if he didn't just threathen to shoot his fireteam leader.

"Why, Cero?" Alric asked.

"He's sad. He doesn't know why he's a guardian. People deal with it differently, and he turns his sadness into rage. I want to keep him from turning into a monster," she smiled at the titan, and he just sagged his shoulders a bit.

"I just hope you won't regret it."

"I know I won't."

-

Log #275

Deji-8 has become less toxic towards Cero, but still seems insufferable towards Alric. It's come to a point where Alric has reported to her that he dreads going on any sort of mission, fearing his safety with the warlock around.

Cero told him to please keep going. Please don't give up on him.

So he keeps trying.

Log #276

Cero's fireteam will start patrol on Venus today. They are finished on the moon, and now need to provide data on the Ishtar Academy. It's said hostile activity has picked up significantly, which is a cause for alarm.

They will leave in two hours.

-

PLAYBACK D.2717.551.VDM.1

"My eyes! My fucking eyes!"

"Stay still, p-please!"

"It hurts!"

"Cero, where's Cero!?"

-

A gunshot.

Alric bit his lip, pulling the eye from the dead vex from its body. He broke his vow. He broke it. He was a murderer. And he had to do it again for the other eye.

All for a person that wished him dead.

His vision got blurry, but he raised his shotgun again, aiming it at the Goblin's core and shooting. He heaved, his disgust towards himself growing immesurably. But despite his newfound self hatred, he needed to give Deji back his sight, or he'd never be able to fight again.

He studied up on exo. He knew what to do. If his hands would just stop shaking.

Oh.

There was acid on them. It was eating at his skin.

No matter.

He tore away the warlocks jacket, still trying to evade the blinded hands from shoving his face, and he pulled the core from Deji's abdomen.

The exo went limp. Alric allowed his tears to fall. He vaguely heard Cero's voice, but he had to fix this first. He could fix him.

He transmatted a few tools, and began to extract the scorched exo eyes.

-

All systems: green  
Launching startup sequence

Coughing. That's the first thing he did. Then he breathed heavily like he'd been pulled from space to Earth. Someone or something had hard reset his core and it hurt.

He opened his eyes. Eyes? Wasn't he blind? The Vex burned his eyes. He should've be blind.

Oh. Alric was in front of him.

The white of his eyes were blue with blood vessels. Had he been crying? Why was he crying?

Deji squinted, his sight had a slightly more vibrant tint to everything. It gave him a headache.

Looking down, he saw Alric's shaking, burned hands covered in Vex acid.

"What did you do?" Deji asked cautiously, and Alric quickly looked away, covering his hands between his legs.

"Just what a teammate would do. I hope I didn't cause any damage to your interal wiring." the titan answered, refusing to meet Deji's gaze.

"You.. what?" Deji sputtered. Had that white haired peace-treaty just saved his sight?

"Guys, theres a pickup team arriving soon to get us out. I can't risk jumping from my spot and I'm worried about the both of you. We're postponing this mission until we're fit for combat," Cero said, and Deji looked up to find his leader on a tiny plateau. She was stuck.

"I'll go grab you, hold on," Deji said, trying to stand up but immediately buckling his knees and falling. Alric caught him.

"Let me-"

"Go? You'll fall and eat Hive shit," Alric interrupted. The exo just scoffed.

-

Log #277

Deji had been saved by Alric in the nick of time. Had his wires burned any further, it would've been impossible to give him new eyes without resetting his memory. The warlock has become less hostile towards Alric. Possibly since he realized Alric is only trying to help. Cero has been treating his burned hands. He visited her this morning to talk to her, and she took the liberty to change his bandages.

He had told her how he felt guilt towards his ghost and the Traveler for breaking his vow. Cero didn't fault him, yet told him his ghost probably wouldn't have minded his violence to save a life. She assured him he was okay, and that it was a good choice in a terrible situation.

-

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	34. Chapter 34

Cero looked on as all the carcasses with trinkets riders used for their monsters to differentiate them were huddled together in a messed up pile. It was sickening. Most of all the way they used what Ara loved most against her. She could ask herself time and time again why the Vex were trying to mess with their mental state as opposed to just killing them. Was it an experiment? Was it to mock their efforts?

No one knew.

But what she did know is that it had to stop, no matter what. If the Vex saw an oppurtunity to succesfully break the spirits of guardians, humanity would be as good as history.

"Cero," she heard, and forced herself to look up at the redhead in front of her. She reached out her hand, placing the cold metal on Ara's warm cheek. The exo carefully tried to wipe off some dried blood from her face, and noticed how the wound on her forehead was probably going to leave a scar.

"I'm sorry we put your through this," Cero whispered, but the taller girl began to shake her head, placing her own hand on top of Cero's.

"If I had the chance to do it again I would. My people are fighting a war now, just as much as your people have for centuries already. If something like this was enough to make me give up I would've picked the wrong job," she said, taking the nightstalkers hand and kissing it gently. Cero's breath hitched. Ara, no matter what, still remained more courageous than any hero in a book.

"I.." she stopped. She knew what she wanted to say, but the meaning of it would probably be too much. She looked down. Ara's armor was covered in acid and blood from the carcasses, and seeing the faint glow of the redhead's rimeblade on her back made Cero realize that it would be impossible for the two of them to really be together. Cero was an undead war machine with the sole purpose of defending the last resistance of humanity, and Ara was never supposed to get entangled in the war they were fighting, let alone meet a guardian.

"Tell me," Ara whispered, and the purple eyed girl felt how close the honey skinned girl's really was. They were inches from one another, as close as they were that night.

"It would hurt you," Cero said back, just loud enough for her to hear. Their foreheads touched, she was so sweet. So caring. She didn't deserve this fate.

"Say it anyway."

"I.. I love you," she gazed up, and saw those grey eyes were shining a soft blue. On her face was a smile, despite the wound on her face, the blood coating her brow and cheek.

"You are the most beautiful person I've ever met, Cero," the Wyverian girl said, and caused the exo's face to fall.

'She's held together by darkness.'

'Stay clear of her, I heard she killed a guardian to steal his vocal wiring.'

'Do you think she deserves to be a guardian? What if she loses control?'

'She'll scatter soon enough and then we have to clean up the mess she leaves behind.'

'That exo failure should've stayed dead.'

'Tiny, useless with a defective ghost. I wish the darkness would take her already, isn't she made from that?'

"You're lying."

"I'm not, Cero. You're beautiful."

"You're..."

"Speaking the truth," Ara pulled the exo close, kissing her cold metal mouth. Cero closed her eyes, finally relaxing for the first time since her resurrection. She had someone who loved her. Ara loved her.

It was like a lost page had been returned to her book, entirely about Ara. She belonged in Cero's life, as unreal as it might've seemed before. The fact Ara wasn't scared of her, didn't care about rumors, didn't give a damn that she was made out of metal was almost too good to be true. But it was. She was right here, holding her. Kissing her. Sharing her love.

She wished it could last forever, but they had one more mission to finish before everything would return to normal.

She turned to the door, and noticed Deji had succesfully hacked the security. He and Alric were patiently leaning against a wall, having their own conversation it seemed.

"You ready? The map is blank after this room, so be prepared. We might run into trouble," Cero said, and took one more good look at Ara before leaving her side to draw her Crimson and lead the way. It was dark, Codex using his shell to light up the way for the group. The freakish walls were ever tall, and gave a sort of intimidating feeling to it. Fog was harsh, and the temperature went down the further they walked.

Cero heard the opening of a bottle, accompanied by an echo, and turned her head to see Ara chug down a red coloured drink.

"What is that?" The exo girl asked, and Ara passed another red filled bottle to Alric. He clumsily caught it, almost dropping it in the process, and looked at the label. It didn't make him much smarter. It was written in Wyverian.

"It's a hot drink. Stuff protects you against extreme cold. I've got one for opposite weather, where it gets so hot your skin might melt off if you don't prepare well," she said, holding up yet another bottle that was slightly covered in a layer of frost.

"Just where do you hunt?" Deji wondered, and Ara hummed.

"Anywhere and everywhere I am required. Drink up, Alric. You'll need it," she said, and the awoken pouted before closing his eyes and also chugging down the concoction. A second later, however, he threw the glass bottle on the ground, coughing and heaving.

"What did you put into that!?" He cried, opening his mouth and trying to fan it with his hands. Ara laughed and skipped forward to join Cero's curious side.

"Some hot peppers from the Volcanic Hollows and a few squashed bitterbugs I found in the Ancestral Steppe. Basic stuff, really. Are you feeling cold?"

"You gave me squashed bugs!?" Alric yelled, and in the background all he could hear was Deji laughing his ass off.

"Do you feel cold?" She asked again, and Alric frowned.

"No." 

"That means it works. Let's move," she said with a grin and shoved Cero, who was still kind of worried about her titan, the man wearing a grimace after finding out just what he drank.

They continued their way, Cero opening the door to the supposed last room of the citadelJjnB9ntQjcVwYLk48rAzwJHGbWdrrYtgFWWcWd4j2khhffzMqLVAZPrAXyzhxnYQbDyVqckCw2DLoWCmwrsGjV6pswxTfxfcTzm87oMMLpaTF4hzs7hcUuRM7WiNrzCiB7BzTdSvNvTC3aJ5f9FMTNF4B7sS47U37QYm8jKQ2ApPhuZr9TxzPcEoKDgwoyoUkFRnd3gFyDjpHzKvd7f3a4sHWu72bColdDarkPainScaredHelpMeHelpMeHelpMeHELPMEITHURTSITHURTS

WHAT IS HAPPENING?

I CAN'T BREATHE.

I CAN'T MOVE.

IT HURTS.

EVERYTHING HURTS.

ARA.

HELP ME.

HELP ME000000000000000000000000000000--------------KJ5gnxUrsfG4KJZnphbkRfxHHt6guEUBgDENvXrENMzRCzBpVaFNWjDP2XfPNS6opBcvK4dvqA3RxX8ijggENcteM6o632J38XF8oJWBj7aUoYktccnBPvFrPdWfjpH2DiZk6K


	35. Chapter 35

Ara watched in terror and confusion how the girl who just confessed her love screamed in an inhuman voice, shrill and static. Watched as her small body spasmed and fell to the floor, contorting in a scary way. She was in pain, her mouth wide open, the purple light turning off and on like a candle fire contstantly moving in the wind. Turning to her stomach, a sharp sound emitted from her metal hands clawing along the unknown material that made up the floor in this hellhole. She was trying to get away from whatever was inside her, eating at her.

"IT HURTS, IT HURTS!"

Ara scrambled to get up, tripping once but catching herself and running towards Cero. But when she kneeled beside the screaming guardian, she was aptly thrown against the wall with brute force, her breath escaping her upon impact. The moment she opened her eyes, Cero was gone, just like the screaming. She heard footsteps run towards her, and a pair of worrying hands pulling her forward slightly, but all she could concentrate on was the marks on the ground where Cero's hand was.

"Get up, Ara. Please-" Alric said in a hushed tone, and the redhead winced when she forced herself to stand. Her back felt like a bunch of Narga spikes were slammed into it.

"Deji, hows the Ghost?" She heard the titan ask his teammate, and Ara listened in a daze. Cero. Cero wasn't here. Where was she?

"Mainframe won't come out. Says Codex is hostile and unable to communicate with. She's scared, and we should be too," the warlock replied, and Ara picked up the word scared.

Scared.

Cero must be scared. Something bad happened to her.

"Flux is telling me to get out of here," Alric said, his voice carrying through her as she was leaning against his chest with her head. She was extremely disoriented.

"We gotta save Cero," she coughed and tried to walk by herself, but fell in a hopeless heap on the floor. Alric's hands were on her right away, checking for any broken bones, but all she could care about was Cero-

"I know, Ara. Just breathe, we can her get out of this," the awoken said quickly. But Ara was breathing. Wasn't she? Her vision was cloudy. She felt like she was floating. Oh. He was right. No air was filling her lungs now that she focused on that.

"'Ric, she's staring right at me," Deji suddenly said, urgency shaking his voice, and Ara looked up.

"Cero," Ara whispered, reaching out a hand. She saw Cero, the room around her blood red. No..

She only realized too late that she was staring at Cero through a bullet hole in her hand.

Cero had shot her hand. Cero.

Ara cried out in pain, covering her bleeding hand. It hurt. It hurt.. no. She had to save Cero. She couldn't just give up after this. She was fine. She was fine!

"My god damn ghost refuses to show up!" Alric yelled at no one in particular. He was frustrated, trying to calm both Ara and himself down at the same time. It didn't really work.

"I don't need it," she grit out, pulling a cloth from her pouch and tying it around her bleeding hand. Alric watched in horror as the redhead stood up. Panic be damned. Pain be damned.

Cero needed her.

"I need you.. to deflect the bullets while I get to her," Ara struggled to say. Her lungs felt like they were beneath eight tons of rubble. She gazed at Alric, partially red in her vision due to her own blood splattering in her eyes and on her face. He nodded jerkily and popped his sentinel shield. Ara saw Deji in a well of radiance, backing them up if things went even more south than they already did. She turned her gaze back to Cero, who stood motionless save for the few unnatural spasms here and there.

It was like she was posessed. Frenzied.

"I'm going," she said and began to run, dodging bullets and hiding behind Alric's shield while ignoring her white pain. It hurt. Everything hurt.

Getting closer, she noticed how Cero's eyes were red like Vex eyes. Like Deji's when he was mad.

"To the left!" she ordered Alric, and she rolled, evading the nightstalker's void arrow by a hair. She sprinted further left, trying to get away from the tether.

"How do you disable an exo?" She asked Alric, who looked at her with a worried glance.

"Cero's core is inside her chest. If you take it out she'll turn off. But it's secured with a lock, so I don't think-"

"You got a spare core?" She asked, pulling him behind a blind spot so they could catch their breath. She heard Deji distract Cero, and she forced Alric to look at him. She asked again, seeing sweat trinkle down the worried titan. He nodded.

"I need you to give me a wall from here to the middle of the room, can you manage that?" The redhead stood, drawing her rimeblade and coating it with her blood. She wasn't feeling pain anymore. The adrenaline rush kept her standing.

"Y-yes," he breathed and readied himself. After a brief second, it was like he punched something, but instead of impact it just summoned a giant barricade. Ara smiled briefly at him.

"Thanks, big guy," she said and ran down the length of the wall. She used her rimeblade's echo against the wall to catch Cero's attention and it worked. The nightstalker ran up to the wall, right next to her and looking like she wanted to murder Ara. It sent a cold shiver down the redhead's spine. The barricade covered in ice, and it sounded like her rimeblade was singing.

"Ara, what the fuck are you doing!?" She heard Deji yell, but she had no time to answer him. The wall would be ending soon.

Just a few more steps.

Three.

Two..

One...

Ara stopped her sprint, twirling around with precise movements, her eyes tracking her target. Cero's chest.

It all happened too fast.

Her rimeblade touched the love of her life.

Ice covered her body, and her lights turned off after she uttered one single thing.

"Ara."

The hunter released her breath, tears falling down her face as she retracted her blade from the limp guardian. She would be okay. She would be okay. She would be okay. She-

"What the fuck, you bitch!"

Ara was shoved against the ground, the adrenaline in her body no longer masking her pain and she cried out. A hand grabbed her throat and she opened one of her grey eyes to see Deji absolutely fuming with rage.

"You fucking maniac, I knew I shouldn't have trusted you!" He roared at her, and she let him. It was like her soul left her body.

Yes.

She pierced her blade into Cero.

"You're a filthy rat. I wish I fucking shot you the moment I saw you on the Shattered Coast," the warlock, fueled by anger, drew the same gun he used for Rathalos and placed the cold metal on Ara's blood covered forehead.

She couldn't speak.

Deji was constricting her.

"Stop! Please!" A voice behind Deji yelled out, desperate. She felt the red exo waver, and used this chance to throw him off of her. Ara coughed, trying to sit up and crawl over to Cero.

"She fucking killed Cero! You helped her kill-"

"She only deactivated the core!" Alric yelled, and the other male fell quiet. Ara felt eyes on her, but she didn't care.

She just wanted to hold Cero.

-

"So you used your sword's element to stop the energy from flowing through," Alric said once he pulled out the black and purple core from Cero's body. It had only a small dent in it, the rest was fully covered in ice. Ara nodded.

She traced her good hand over her sword, gazing at the exo. Her exo.

"I thought you murdered her," Deji whispered, sitting close by Alric as he was working. The exo looked like he needed mental care after all that. She didn't blame him. Ara would probably do the same if she saw it the way Deji did.

"I know it seemed like that," Ara replied. She looked at her hand. It was completely soaked in blood and hurt like a bitch.

"We gotta fix you up," Deji muttered. The redhead smiled at his sudden change in behaviour, but shook her head.

"Cero first. We have to find out what happened to her."


	36. Chapter 36

She saw everything that happened. From the blow she dealt to Ara, gazing at a mortified Deji, shooting through Ara's hand, trying to put a rain of bullet through Alric's shield and almost killing the redhead beyond the wall.

It was like she watched through a screen. It showed her hands, her light and even Codex, but nothing felt like her. She had been controlled by something unknown. Something that tried to take over her mind. It almost succeeded, too. The borders around her vision closed the more she hurt her team.

She was in a pool of darkness. Her core had been shut down, but she wasn't gone. Ara had done something to her. Something smart. That's just like that girl. God she loved her so much. Why was everything beautiful always so short lived? She didn't even know what would happen after this.

Her Ghost's words of nothingness were buzzing through her, keeping her alive. Codex always did his job. But there was something else. Something sinister lurking around her. Waiting to strike.

It was successful once. She wouldn't allow it to corrupt her a second time. Was it SIVA nano tech? No. That stuff wasn't on Venus, let alone inside the Citadel. Vex hacked into her. Trying to eat her data. The funny part was that she didn't have any. Just a bunch of zero's. Maybe that's why it couldn't strike again. That's why it was just waiting.

She laughed at the irony of it all, her voice sounded like she was deep underwater. She was entirely made out of non biological parts, yet the most robotic hiveminded enemy failed to completely corrupt her system. She didn't even know why she herself was alive.

All she could do was wait.

-

"They hacked her, but failed to take over completely. They ended up using her Ghost to corrupt data and uploaded it to her while we weren't looking. Codex is fine now since he was just a bridge, but he's in standby so I can't really make any mistakes during this," Alric said, setting aside the little ghost. Codex's eye was black. No light emitting from it. The titanbit his lower lip as he carefully opened up Cero's head. He unwired some cables and attached them to a holopad, making the fimiliar purple zero's appear. It also showed something else. Something that wasn't supposed to be there. Symbols not from earth, or from exo origin.

"There's still a hint of corruption present. I don't know if I can take it out," the awoken sighed, and Deji's hand was on his back immediately, Ara noticed. Deji had always stayed pretty close to Alric, now that she thought about it. She wondered what their history was.

"Try it," the warlock simply said, and Alric nodded. Ara looked down at herself, covered in her own mostly dried blood. What would've happened if she was a second too late? Cero was aiming her hand cannon's bayonet straight at her head. She would've been pierced by it, and presumably killed. But besides that, what would've become of Deji if he had actually pulled the trigger on her? Would he regret it? She gazed at the normally hot headed guardian, all curled up close to Alric staring at his leader, uncouncious and hooked up on holopads and tools. He looked vulnerable. Close to breaking. In a sense this whole team was pretty tired after all they've endured. The portals, Cero going to Wyveria, her teammates tirelessly searching for her, the failed raid and Alric's amnesia. Now they had no contact with the surface and were stuck in an alien maze while the only person who could potentially fix Cero was the titan, and he didn't know what kind of corruption he was dealing with.

What in the world had her life become?

She originally started her journey for a cure for her ill mother, but somehow she ended up meeting a girl from an unknown world, and was now roped up in trying to save her people from doom, plus another one. It was crazy to think about. No books in the guild archives ever said something about life beyond her world. The specks in the night sky were just specks. Not entire systems with advanced technology, immortal soldiers and war. She'd spent hours just looking up during her expeditions. Out of fascination and lack of anything else to do while waiting, but to actually be lightyears away from her home world was bizarre. She learned a lot in the short while she spent on Earth, Mars and Venus. She learned about the people around her. From watching Deji assemble and disassemble guns like it was a morning routine, Cayde preferring to eat his noodles with spice in them, Alric reading every single book on exo knowledge and proving to be a really good engineer, to holding Cero during the short nights they had together. It was bittersweet.

Cero could never settle down. Not with Ara. Once they were done with this, everyone would return to their respective worlds and contact would probably cease to prevent another catastrophic event crossing their unassuming world.

Cero had died once. And she'd come back with the purpose of defending her people. She couldn't abandon that job, and Ara was a guild hunter. She had to be on call. What if a threat came to Dundorma? A threat like Shagaru Magala? Wyveria needed her, just like Earth needed Cero.

"Ara, are you okay?" The static voice of Deji returned her from her negative spiral of thoughts, and she saw Deji had come closer to her. He was hesitant, but still did it. He was holding a cloth, a flask of water and some other tools. She observed him for a moment. None of his normal pride was there, none of his snapping remarks and shutdowns. It was just him, and his desire to help Ara with the pain she quietly dealt with.

"It must hurt. Your hand. Let me fix it, I can't be of any help when Alric does his nerd shit," Deji said with a weak smile and Ara relented, unwrapping the disgusting, blood crusted kerchief from her destroyed hand and taking off her glove with a pained expression. There was a hole in it alright. It was still bleeding. The healing potion calmed it down but Deji was right. She needed medical help. Ignoring this one wasn't going to fix it.

"Damn. That's a true Borealis round. It's a miracle your glove stopped the bullet," he said while cleaning up the dark blood around her hand. She grimaced, not at the pain, but at the realization that yes, Cero had indeed shot her. Had she angled herself slightly different, the bullet would've went right through Ara's neck. Instead it scratched her enhanced chest armor. She had always been exceptionally lucky. During one of her fights against a Rajang, the thing picked her up and straight up squeezed 'till she heard (and felt) bones break, but then wonder above wonder, a Najarala decided to dig up from the ground exactly where the Rajang was standing, and launched the damned monkey so far it released her from its grasp. The two monsters broke out into a turf war and Ara could crawl to camp. It still made her shiver how close the rabid predator was, it's chaotic eyes staring through her soul as if it enjoyed squeezing the life out of her body.

"This might sting," Deji said, and Ara nodded. The exo opened a bottle of alcohol and poured some on a clean cloth. He then dabbed around the wound with a tenderness she rarely saw from the man. He looked engrossed into cleaning up the hole, and Ara smiled for a while. He didn't hate her after all. He wouldn't have offered to help her if he did. He was fueled by rage back then, seemingly thinking his leader had been killed by someone that he had no real background check on. Just words, and trust that must've shattered in an instant. Ara wasn't even from Earth. Her smile disappeared.

"You keep staring off into space, missy," the exo noticed. Ara gazed at him, her vision a bit fuzzy. The edges around his red frame clothed with the rusty warlock armor and tattered coat were giving some kind of blur, and it caused him to look less threathening than he normally did.

"Don't go crying now. 'Ric's got more knowledge on Birdie than the vanguard. He can get rid of whatever corruption's invaded her data," he tried to comfort her, but it caused more distress than calm. The dreadful reality just bit her in her ass all over again. The words he used were unknown to a mere hunter. Ara only knew because she went to the Sol system to fight robotic aliens trying to reform planets.

After this mission was done, she'd probably never see Cero again. The portals would be closed or destroyed-

"Girl, calm down. Am I hurting you? Use your voice," Deji said, lightly tapping her cheekbone to get her attention.

"I just.." she choked. No. She couldn't bring those thoughts upon him. It was useless. They had better things to worry about, like save the damn planet. Feelings like this would only benefit the Vex.

"Listen to me. We are getting out of this. So is Cero. We've been in stickier situations," he trailed on, and Ara bowed her head. The tears wouldn't stop.

"I don't wanna get out of this. I- I'll lose you all," Ara bit her tongue the moment the words escaped her. She was selfish. His cold hand left her cheek, and she felt his thumb and index finger lift up her chin.

"You think we'll never see you after this? Once we establish your planet's coördinates I'm sure we'll figure out a way to attend your birthday parties. I know it might seem like this is the end, but trust me, it's not. I haven't even taught you how to ride a sparrow yet," Deji told her in his static voice. The coldness that made up his demeanor was gone.

"How do I know you're telling the truth? How do I know it's not just a lie to make me feel better?" She whispered, and a sob threathened to escape. He sighed, holding her good hand into his own gloved one.

"You don't. I don't. I can't look into the future, but I know Birdie won't just let you go. She's too stubborn for her own good," the exo told her, and Ara looked at him for a few seconds. Then she gave a barely visible nod. She didn't know what else was waiting for them, she just wished everything would be okay, in a sense that she could still talk to everyone in the end.

"I'll have to stitch up that wound, by the way. Can't have your skin be all fucked up when you get back. People will think bad of us," the warlock said. After recollecting herself somewhat, Ara held her hand out for him again with a teary smile, and he wasted no time in getting to work.

Would she really still be a part of their lives after this mission?


	37. Chapter 37

The mortals of the bunch were getting tired, Cayde noticed. During the rigorous battle, the Wyverians finally showed signs of fatigue. Their stamina was incredible, but even they had limits. They weren't guardians. They didn't have their own ghost to help them, Cayde had to remind himself. The commander that was in charge of the Wyverians together with Ara, a nearly white haired male taller than Zavala had suffered a lot of damage. He had been on the front lines the entire time, getting beat up like a punching bag but never laying still. It was brutal to watch, but he had many skills. Next to that, a girl with fierce cat-like eyes and buzzed hair was spitting command formation changes and teamed up with attacks, taking down champions. They were starting to read the Vex like predators were reading prey. The whole bunch was fighting tirelessly, but something was starting to eat at him.

Parallax had disappeared from the radar, and still wasn't back. It had been nearly four hours. He was starting to think something went wrong. No one had a map of the Citadel, and the radio signal was jammed by the large network overruling the structure. He could only hope they were okay.

"Hey, mister vanguard," a high pitched voice came from his left, and he turned to see a small girl without a weapon smiling at him. She had been grazed by several bullets, her tanned face bleeding but not failing to show an innocent blush. Her long, tangled hair reached the ground and had several braids in random places. All she was wearing was a one sleeved dress made from what seemed like an unknown animal's hide and a bag with a leaf stuck on it. Was she a hunter too?

"Yes, little lady?" He answered her, a little hesitant, and her eyes became cresent as she gave a toothy smile.

"I think I found a way to shut down the evil robot army," she whispered like it was a secret, holding up her hand to hide her mouth from the fray. Cayde blinked.

"You're one of the Wyverians, right?" He asked, curious.

"Yes! If you would follow me I can take you to the one responsible for this whole robot invasion," she said, her messy, long hair bouncing as she jumped up and down. She was like a.. teen? No. Younger. She was like a child. Who let her in? How did she know about the hivemind that connected the Vex if she had never seen it before?

"Uh, sure. Take the lead," he frowned, an bit confused as he yanked his cloak back over his head.

"Be reaaaally quiet, mister vanguard. It has some lackeys watching the area," she explained. The girl barely reached his chest plate, and Cayde himself wasn't even that tall.

"Kid, may I ask, what's your name?"

"My name is Lissa, and I'm a scout honoured to serve under his Immenseness! I grew up in the forest and a hunter saved me from a Nargacuga. Since that day I scout out unknown areas. I noticed some movement from behind the Citadel so I went to check it out. Then I found a really special looking floaty guy and I ran to get you, mister vanguard! I run super fast, like lightning! I became a scout when I was five years old! Now I'm ten. The red haired crown said you guys are immortal, is that true!?" Lissa rambled, and Cayde wondered how it turned out like this. The girl shifted from one topic to another like a bouncy ball. It was hard to keep up with. And given he was fimiliar with his own mind, that said a lot.

".. you're ten years old," he repeated, and saw her turn around to look at him as she walked backwards.

"Yes sir!" She grinned, and Cayde noticed one of her canines were missing.

"So how did you get through the Venus portal?" The vanguard couldn't help but wonder. It was absurd. No one would let a child join a war, right? ...right?

"His Immenseness issued me to scout out Venus, and report back on my findings. I don't fight, Mister vanguard. I just find things. Things like that thing over there," Lissa said, suddenly pointing to a gigantic Hydra with floating wires hovering behind five gatekeepers. It was hidden behind a bunch of trees and overgrown plants.

"Talk about overkill. That thing's gotta go," the exo muttered, and Lissa started to climb one of the trees surrounding them.

"Do you have a fancy sniper on you, mister vanguard?" The girl asked. She held out her small hands and he pressed his lip plates together for a second.

"One shot isn't gonna stop that thing, and we'll die if we miss anyway," he tried to reason, but she rolled her eyes.

"Just give it to me, I have a plan," Lissa insisted, and he frowned, but unstrapped his sniper anyway. He threw the thing up and the small scout caught it easily. What was it with Wyverians and strength?

"Now I want you to run straight towards the big guy. You hunters can turn invisible, right?"

"What!? I mean, yes- but!" Cayde stuttered, and she just stared at him. He stared back. Her eyes were like fire. The kind that could burn forever. "Yes, I can turn invisible. But only for about roughly ten seconds." He sighed.

"Ten seconds is more than enough. Catch this. It's explosives," the dark haired girl threw the leaf decorated bag she was holding onto right at him, and he barely reveived it. The exo looked at it, a bit taken aback.

"Before you get noticed by the big boys, turn invisible and throw the bag under the floaty guy, then bunny jump away and hide behind that pillar thing there. With the lights on it," she pointed to one of the Vex structures behind the Hydra, and Cayde honestly didn't know what to say anymore. How did the kid know all this? This girl just showed up out of nowhere, knows that Cayde was in charge of guardians, even knowing his title, understands how the Vex work and owns a bunch of explosives. How!?

Cayde fidgeted with his cloak, staring at the girl. Was she even real? Was this not another Vex simulation? Did they find out how to merge simulations with reality?

"Your call, mister vanguard. We might as well try since there's nothing else to stop those things," Lissa said after Cayde stayed quiet, holding the handmade bag in his gloved hand. She adjusted the scope on the sniper like she had invented the thing, and laid down on a thick branch, waiting for him.

"Fuck it," he mumbled under his breath and started to run.

Just before he managed to get noticed by the Gatekeepers he rolled and turned invisible, grasping the bag tightly as he ran between the gigantic champions guarding the Hydra. He took a deep breath, throwing the bag under the hovering Vex with near perfect accuracy and jumped away as fast as he could, turning visible in the air and landing safely behind the Vex pillar Lissa had told him to hide behind. He held his breath, waiting for a sniper shot to ring through his ears.

It was quick, and piercing his hearing in the silence. The sounds of war were muffled behind the many objects and trees, and all Cayde could hear now was the bag exploding and causing him to cling to the pillar for safety.

In the short amount of time he'd known her, she kept on surprising him. It was awkward, not being the one in charge of things. A child had told him what to do.

"Hey, mister vanguard! The big thingies are all down!" The bubbly voice was heard from beyond Cayde's hiding spot and he peeked his head around the Vex structure.

"No way, it actually worked!?" His mouth hung open, and a little giggle from Lissa filled his ears. Unbelievable. This girl was unbelievable.

"Let's go check on Wonder and the bunch! See if it stopped everything!" She skipped up to the exo, holding the sniper close to her small body and smiling that toothy smile again.

"Not bad, kid," Cayde said, and ruffled her already tangled hair. She swatted his hand away with a grin and gave him back his sniper, which he gratefully took back. It was extremely off-putting to see a small child with a weapon that big. Yet that same child just saved around 400 people. Mortals and guardians.

"You're insane," he sighed with a small smile and followed the tanned girl who was already running towards the open grounds, jumping over moss covered rocks and beckoning Cayde to follow her.

-

"They just kinda fell down," the buzzed girl said, kicking a vex Goblin in the shin and sneering at it. Wonder was standing next to her, equally as confused.

"I guess that concludes our mission?" A hunter said, removing his helmet and revealing that he was in fact blind. Both of his eyes were a ghostly tone, and Cayde just continued to be surprised at the people that Ara had gathered.

"Get ships so we can bring everyone to the tower for now. I'll stay behind to wait for Parallax," Cayde said to a warlock girl who was awaiting any orders. She nodded firmly and proceeded to call for pickups.

"It's gonna be a tight fit, but I think we can manage," he muttered more to himself than to Wonder, who was looking at him.

"You think they're fine in there? Want me to look?" He offered, but Cayde quickly shook his head no.

"We can't just send a lone man into the Citadel. Ara managed because she's surrounded by people specialized in missions like this, but I can't send you down there too. You're their commander," Cayde spared a look at him, and Wonder nodded. He looked so beaten up it was a miracle he still stood.

"I suppose you're right. You could try sending one of my scouts, though," Wonder shrugged, and Cayde's gaze instantly traveled to Lissa who was playing with a butterfly.

"No," Cayde said quickly. "And can you tell me this instant why there is a child on the battlefield?" his tone dropped, and he pointed at the girl who managed to down the entire army.

"Oh, her? She's been raised by a few monsters in the forest. We found her after a Nargacuga killed a Zinogre that was taking care of her, and we got her out of there. We realized she's highly intelligent, being able to adapt to humans in less than a month, thus his Immenseness made her a scout so she could still be free while the guild kept an eye on her. This mission is different, however. Lissa is fast. She's also small and able to go up places other scouts have trouble getting to. In a way she's our best bet for discovering new things," Wonder explained, and Lissa approached a titan with the vibrant butterfly on her hand. The guardian looked a little puzzled, but kneeled down and started to talk to her.

"That's insane. I wondered how she was able to figure things out so quickly," Cayde said, watching the butterfly land on her nose, and then fly away.

"I'll wait alone. You guys go to the tower and get your hunter's patched up," Cayde decided, and sat down on a blood overed rock. Time to wait.


	38. Chapter 38

When Cero woke up, she remembered the fight. She remembered shooting her teammates, trying to kill Ara with her hunting knife and then the darkness developing around her. The hum of her ghost keeping her alive was enough to make her calm down, but she's panicking again. Ara was in front of her. Covered in blood, ragged and injuried. She smiled, that was the worst part. She smiled at Cero, the scum that tried to kill her.

"How are you feeling?" The nightstalker heard from beside her. It was Alric, holding a holopad with a record of her code on it. She tried to open her mouth but nothing came out. She refused to look these people, her people, in the eyes. She betrayed them, almost erased them from her world.

She didn't deserve to live, she was faulty. Not worthy of being a guardian. Who goes against their own fireteam?

Cero was..

A set of warm arms wrapped around her torso, and she saw the red locks of the mortal girl filling her vision. She wanted to scream, to thrash, to push her away. Cero didn't deserve this girl. She didn't deserve Ara's love.

"I know that wasn't you, Cero. You were infected. Alric told me, but I knew already. It takes you over, makes you feral. Like frenzy," Ara murmured in where her collarbone would be was she made of flesh and bones. Ara was warm. Ara was here, alive. Talking to her and treating her like a *person*.

"Frenzy..?" Was all she managed to grit out. Cero felt the redhead nod, and her soothing voice explained the meaning.

"Back on Wyveria, there is a monster called Gore Magala. It kind of resembles you, actually. Black with purple," she smiled, and pulled back somewhat to meet Cero's eyes. "Only looks, though. It's vicious, and you're sweet. I used some of its material to fix your battered gear back when we met. It has these scales that shed particles and make other monsters go crazy. They'll attack anything and ultimately die of the virus. Those who survive become apex. They're the type of monsters I hunt most to ensure the safety of the people. They're murderous but I know it's not what these monsters would want. You couldn't control it, like the frenzy. Don't be sorry. Please. You have nothing to be sorry for," she said, the plea at the end so sincere, so raw that Cero wanted to sob. To cry. To just be human so she could respond with the same sincerity as Ara.

But she wasn't human. Would never be.

"I don't understand.." she whispered, more to herself than to her team, and in the end it didn't matter. She never knew anything.. Nothing of her world made sense. It was just war and something beyond her comprehension.

She didn't even understand herself.

Cero. A bunch of zero's. Able to be corrupted and acting according to the enemy's will.

She grabbed her antennae, trying to get rid of the thoughts in her head, and she felt warm hands envelop her own smaller ones again, like a safety blanket. She looked up immediately, seeing Ara use her injured hand to comfort a fucking robot.

Just a heap of scrap metal.

"Alric, Deji, could you scout ahead? I need to talk to Cero," the redhead suddenly said, authority not missed by the two guardians. They nodded mutely and Deji helped the awoken stand up. They shuffled forward a bit hesitantly, but Cero couldn't really look as Ara entered her vision once more.

This time, she was frowning. Her usually soft and beautifully groomed brows were knit together in concern.

"Tell me what's bothering you," she said, and Cero winced.

She couldn't tell Ara. It would just be a burden.

"Nothing-"

"Don't lie to me."

"I'm not.." she tried again, and Cero could see Ara lose her cool.

"You've been looking miserable even before we went down the Citadel. Hell, you went completely mute when you thought I was dead. You can't tell me there's nothing wrong when clearly something's eating away at you. Please tell me, because I don't know how to interpret your silence," Ara looked drained, tired. Tired of Cero? Probably.

"I'm.. I-" her throat failed to produce sound, and she avoided Ara's gaze.

"You trust me, don't you?"

"I do! I do.. I just don't know how to tell you," Cero looked around, frantic, searching for anything. A way out, an escape. This was the first time Ara ever confronted her. Ever wanted an answer.

"Is it about the fact you're exo?"

Cero felt like throwing up. Ara had figured her out, even if she claimed she didn't. Her eyes went dim, she wanted to go back into stasis. Avoid all of this. Avoid confrontation. All it did was hurt her.

"I feel like I'm not real," Cero said after an agonizingly long minute of just them.

"Why?" Ara replied in a small voice, latching onto Cero's cold, disgustingly cold hand.

"I'm a robot. I'm the only exo who hasn't been confirmed to be a former human. I don't have the exo nightmares. I don't have code. I have nothing. I am nothing, just an unfortunate program sentient enough to be a pawn of war. I don't understand why I'm alive, Ara. I know even less about myself compared to a guardian who just got ressurrected by their ghost! Everyday I wish I was human so I could respond to your love in a way you deserve it, but in the end I just tried to fucking kill you. Why did the Traveler choose me?"

Cero didn't look at the redhead. She could feel her shaking hands in her own, and wondered just why Ara felt so strongly for someone like her.

"Remember the day you fell into Wyveria?" Ara said, her voice breaking. Cero didn't look up.

"I was chasing that Seregios for three days. Thinking about how it's just the same. Every day. Every night. I know the Everwoods like my pockets, and that forest is an ever changing anomaly. I try to protect people, but every week I hear how someone died by the hands of an apex threat I was too slow or too busy to report to. I chased that seregios. It killed the child of a Tanzia family and migrated further north. I chased it, and then you came along," Ara stopped, squeezing Cero's hand.

Cero didn't look up.

"You shot it once. With your sniper. I wondered, how? An apex predator that killed an innocent human got taken down by a stranger much smaller than me. I wondered what did I miss? Then you said hey, and I wondered why did your voice sound like that?" Ara chuckled, the sound miserable through sobs.

"You wanted me to teach you my language, and I wondered how can you not speak Wyverian? It's our only language, descended from the first Wyverians. Then I saw your eyes. Or rather, your led lights. They were breathtaking. Then you opened your mouth and the same purple colour emitted from within you. I wondered who are you, really?"

Cero didn't look up.

"It didn't take long for me to understand you weren't from here. You looked at nature as if it was the first time you ever saw it. Later on, it was true. You'd never seen nature like on my planet. The flutterflies liked you," another chuckle, followed by a sniffle.

"When I came back injured, I expected Fluffy to in my caravan. He was out with palicoes and you were there instead. I was dying. I realized that, yet you and Codex brought me back. Then you spoke my language and I wondered am I dreaming? There's no way she can fluently speak Wyverian. Cero, you made my dull, repetitive world turn colourful again. I have a chance, finally, to cure my mother once we get out of this. My journey will be worth something. All because you fell into my hands and stole my heart so easily. You're everything to me."

Cero caved. She started sobbing, wailing. Desperately holding onto the only pillar she had left before a crushing weight would end her life.

Ara.

Ara, so beautiful and fierce. So soft and sweet. She was everything Cero could wish for and more. 

"I'm here, don't worry," the redhead shushed, petting Cero's cloaked head.

"I- I'm s-sorry.." the petite exo sobbed against Ara's chest. She heard a soft chuckle and dared to look up. Ara looked at her with only love, and captured her into a kiss that caused her to melt.

"We're getting out of this alive. All of us. Let's bring an end to the Vex," the blademaster said, her grey eyes piercing Cero's. They had a hint of blue.


	39. Chapter 39

It was a mistake to send Parallax down the heart of the Citadel. Deji realized it the moment they opened the Rathalos door.

Ara and Cero's mental health was about as strong an old slab of concrete dropped from a 20 story building. The Vex knew that, and yet they were both here. Deji was mad at command. Mad at himself, for allowing them to go. Even if they were both leaders by heart, the last few missions had really fucked with their heads. It didn't help that the two of them were obviously in love and let their emotions get in the way of this. Ara was more capable under pressure and it showed. She was able to gather so much men in such a short time, able to fight like a maniac with just a sword, yet if people she cared about got hurt, she tunnel visioned. Cero had only been at this for a year and still had trouble taking the reigns in some situations, overwhelming confrontations causing her to have a hard time with orders.

The Vex saw that, and even though so far it hadn't worked, they wanted to break the whole team one by one. The source of this shit situation was more than just an enemy of humanity. It was reveling in the torment of others.

"Think they'll be okay?" He heard Alric's voice from behind him. Deji grunted, mostly not knowing what to make of this whole ordeal anymore. Up on the surface, mortals from another world possibly billions of lightyears away were fighting alongside guardians to try and stall time for four people who didn't have a damn clue what they got themselves into. Cero got hacked, Ara damn near lost her mind at the first area they entered, and there was a chance a monster rider is still out there, somewhere. He grit his mouth plates.

"Just gotta keep moving. Let's scout out the next area," Deji told him. He needed to come up with something. Anything. But it was probably only going to get worse from here on out. The exo looked at his teammate, who gazed at him with a quiet curiosity. Those eyes were alive as always, and that's when it hit Deji.

The Vex were capable of killing them. Really killing them.

If they managed to override Cero, then what about their ghosts?

He needed to be careful.

"Let's go," he muttered, and Alric frowned but followed him regardless.

-

Past the next doorway was another eerily empty, straight hallway. Alric was in front, ready to deploy any type of shield and for once actually looked like he wanted to shoot something. Deji almost smiled if it wasn't this shithole that made him look like that.

"I'm detecting hostile activity in the room up ahead~" Flux popped up, twirling around the titan.

"They really think they stand a chance," Alric sighed, and the warlock chuckled.

"I'm starting to like it when you're mad. Keep doing that," Deji pat him on the back and it made the white haired man turn around, blushing slightly.

"We're on a mission, concentrate," the younger guardian hissed, pointing his gloved index finger at his teammate.

"Sir, yes sir!" Deji mocked him and grinned at the disgruntled awoken.

They walked through the corridor without any major events happening as the warlock predicted, but the next door was something else.

"Is that Latin?" Alric wondered out loud. The exo shrugged, summoning Mainframe to scan the old text.

The door was covered in it. Different sized words, random font, glowing lights.

"Blood."

"Where?" Deji asked, coming closer to a curious Alric.

"Right here. A handprint. How did.."

"It's probably that rider twintails talked about before. If they're injured we gotta hurry," the warlock told him, but Alric frowned.

"How does a person from Wyveria know latin, and how the hell are they able to open this giant door while injured? Think about it," the awoken punched the door for good measure, the thing not budging despite the very powerful right hook. Mainframe turned back without anything to report, claiming it was just bogus words put together. The exo held out his hand and transmatted his ghost back into his inventory.

"Secret passage?" Glowing eyes scanned his teammate, who nodded.

"Definetly."

"Let's look around," Deji sighed and started to backtrack, touching the wall to see if there was something out of place. This was the biggest mindfuck of his life so far. No previous raid came close to this. At least during his other missions he had hints or mechanics leading the way or where to go, but this was just a spiral of weird shit. He was never going to understand the Vex. Nobody was. Not even Osiris despite his madman talk about the Infinite Forest.

"Blood leads to this and then it stops," Alric said, his clear voice echoing in the large corridor. Deji trotted back to him, holstering his rifle to his back and examining the floor. It seemed normal.

"Lemme scan it," the warlock sighed and pulled up Mainframe once more, but the ghost was silent.

"No luck, huh. Aren't hunters like, crazy strong?" Alric asked.

"Isn't this person someone who rides monsters like ponies, though? I doubt they can even wield Ara's sword."

"Want me to punch the floor?"

"You just love punching anything but the enemy, don't you?" Deji pointed out, raising a browplate in question.

"Hey, I'm still a titan," Alric argued, shrugging with a smile.

He positioned himself, taking a deep breath and Deji stepped back incase debris was going to fly at him. The awoken struck, and lo and behold, a hatch broke.

"Well I'll be damned. How did the rider find that?" Deji wondered, looking down the dark hole and then back at Alric, who managed to break his hand.

"Reckless. You should be glad your ghost never fuckin' complains about you," the warlock shook his head, making the white haired male pout as he was being healed by Flux's light.

"Let's hop in."

-

"It's clear!" Deji yelled from below, and looked around. It was another corridor, this one twisted and dark. It was extremely cold, and the warlock saw frost form on his armor.

"Might wanna take it easy. It's like a freezer down here," he said, and heard the titan drop behind him with a loud thud.

"Jesus, you're right. What the hell are they doing down here?"

"Keeping secrets, obviously."

They walked forward slowly, checking corners and holding angles on the twisted route. Their only light was their ghosts, and it seemed like the way wasn't gonna stop for a while.

"This doesn't feel right," Alric whispered, and Deji stopped, calling for the titan to come closer to him.

"Think we should wait for the girls. Hell I ain't got guts but something's telling me to stop and go back," he cocked his head at the awoken. His partner looked down, his luminated eyes slightly shining down on his chest piece and rifle.

"We need to find that rider. Once we do, we'll wait for Cero and Ara. I gotta hear what that person went through to get this far if they're still alive," Alric said, wasting no more time to wait for Deji to catch up. The exo sighed and trailed behind the tall man.

-

"Clear," Alric said and dropped down before the passed out Wyverian boy that still looked to be in his teens. He was sitting against a locked door, covered in blood.

"What the hell?" Deji muttered as he eyed the uncouncious person. He looked somewhat similar to hunters, but he only had a knife and had taken off his shirt to use it as a bandage for his arm.

"He's still alive but lost a lot of blood and a fever got him good." the awoken held out Flux who began scanning the stranger, healing him the best she could.

They were both quiet as they waited, until Deji spoke up.

"About the raid.." he tried, and Alric sighed.

"If this is about my memories, they're still not back," the titan looked at his teammate, biting the inside of his cheek.

"I know, that's why I wanna talk."

"If we let our emotions get in the way of this you know exactly what's gonna happen. Look at Cero. She's been a mess eversince she got back," Alric sighed, using his time to fetch a bottle of water and some food for the passed out rider.

"I just wanted to ask if you remember our kiss."

Deji watched the titan stop moving, holding an apple in his hand but not putting it down. Deji waited.

It felt agonizingly long until Alric spoke up, and when he did, it's what Deji expected.

"I don't."

"Figured."

"Why are you bringing this up?" Alric wondered, standing up and eyeing his teammate.

"'Cuz we might not make it back. And I want you to know how I feel about you," the exo shrugged, trying to play it off like he wasn't nervous beyond belief.

"I can't talk about this now, Dej'," the awoken rubbed his temple with his gloved hand, and Deji nodded.

"Guess we won't then," he said, grabbing the apple from Alric and throwing it up and down, waiting. He couldn't get mad about this. Not again. Alric had been through enough.


	40. Chapter 40

Cero and Ara looked at the rider, his shivering body and clattering teeth prominent as they approached the small group gathered in a corner of the twisted hall.

"He doesn't speak," Deji said when they caught up fully, Ara taking another hot drink from her pouch.

"I'm pretty sure he's terrified," Ara kneeled down, carefully holding the glass bottle to the boy's lips even though said boy didn't move an inch. His eyes were bloodshot and wide open, his lips set in a thin line. He might've been in shock. He seemed to be from a forest tribe, his smudged facepaint a traditional way of showing his spot in the many tribes. Even though Wyveria had cities and towns, many people still fended for themselves in secluded area's surrounded by nature. It was the way of the first Wyverians, and many still abided by those beliefs that the Gods would treat them right if they lived alongside nature like the grass on plains, the water in creeks. Flowing with the wind.

"I'm a hunter. I've come here to save you," the redhead said, causing the rider to look up at her slightly, curiosity peaking. Thank god he was okay. Alric said he'd healed him over comms but that he may still be weak since he was a mortal unlike a lightbearer. Guardians could only do so much.

"How did you get here?" She asked while taking his shivering hand and placing the drink in it. The boy slowly raised his hand and took the hot drink, sighing after consuming it all.

"Some flashing circle. My Rathalos.. he was still young. He approached it and we got sucked in like a Tigrex roar! He.. Rathalos, did you find him? Is he okay? He has a ribbon-" the rider quickly searched his bag, taking out the same coloured ribbon the Rathalos was wearing. Deji looked away. "Please, I need to know!" He pleaded, and Ara looked down at her own hands. They were still caked in blood from her own injuries.

"He's returned to the old Gods. He'll watch you from afar," she softly said, feeling the boy tremble. A sob escaped him, and the blademaster hugged him carefully.

"Guys, Flux is detecting hostile activity approaching us. Whatever you wanna ask him, I suggest you do it now," Alric sounded concerned, but Ara took her time regardless.

"How did you get so far? How did you get past all the doors?" She asked him, and he sniffled once.

"Rathalos, he guided me. He showed me hidden paths. Then he got taken away, and I got shot by a burning fire. I found the last path by myself which led me here. I thought I'd bleed out until those two.. men found me," he looked over the redhead's shoulder at the two guardians holding their position towards the long end of the hall, and Ara hummed when she felt the rider clutch her armor like a lifeline.

"Well, I think we won't have to be here much longer. You can go home soon. What is your name?"

"It's Zoren. I'll make sure to tell my people of what you did, hunter," he let go of the hug, sitting back with a slight groan.

"We'll pick you up after we clear this mission. I'll leave this device by you so you can contact these three people at any given time if there's something going on," Ara took off her comm, attaching it to Zoren's ear. Cero pulled the blademaster's arm in haste, and they left before Zoren could say anything else.

"You took too long, twintails. They might be on our ass already," Deji huffed, holding a well at the ready in case shit went south.

"He was terrified and just lost a monster he had bonded with traditionally. You can't gloss over something like that, it's cruel" Ara responded with a frown glaring at the back of Deji's head.

"Surprise! The entire universe is cruel. For all we know they wiped out the surface while we were chatting with that rider-"

"Shut up, Deji, for fucks sake," Cero threw a knife at him with the sheath end, causing Deji to slightly turn and huff.

"Hostile activity increasing. Please navigate somewhere else or neutralize threat~" Flux said inside all comms, and Cero stopped Ara.

"Be on guard," she hissed at the taller woman. Ara nodded and unsheathed her Rimeblade, the ice around it freezing the air in the immediate area. They waited.

Like always, silence.

Deji scoffed at the cowardice of these Vex. 

"Advance slowly," Cero whispered, and they did just that.

After what seemed like forever, they reached a door. It was slightly ajar.

"What the fuck?" Deji asked for what seemed like the 100th time.

"This is a regular house door.." Cero stated, tracing her hand over the slightly chipped, red paint.

"No, Cero. Look closely," Ara lifted her hand, pointing at a slight chip in the wood from when Cero accidentally fired a light bowgun recovery bullet at the door-

"While cleaning. You knew I tried out your guns?" She turned, her LED eyes wide. Ara looked oddly calm.

"I noticed I missed a bullet. I never use recovery mags and had them on a rounded up number. This door is my caravan door."

"Those bastards!" Cero grit her mouth plates, kicking the door wide open to reveal an abyss so big she didn't see the bottom. Deji was the one who luckily pulled her back to the surface.

"Not so fast, Birdie," he drawled, and Cero gulped, eyes wide and jaw set.

"Does it ever end?" Alric asked. He looked tired of the whole mission, and Ara was quiet too. They must've been in here for hours already.

"Only one way to find out," Cero muttered. Deji beckoned Ara, and the redhead held onto him so they could descend once more.

They ended up in another empty room. It was round and the walls were covered in Vex statues, but something felt heavy in the pits of their stomachs, and Ara became slightly nauseous upon landing.

"Are you okay?" Cero approached her, gently putting a stray lock of hair behind her ear. Ara nodded, a weak smile on her lips as she stood fully again.

"It feels like the black garden here. This isn't good. We should-" Alric got cut off by a deafening sound.

An explosion? No. A roar.

Fimiliar to only one person.

"ALRIC! MAKE A SHIELD, NOW!" Ara desperately screamed, and Alric activated his sentinel in a panic. Rocks like meteors roared down, impacting everything around them and causing utter chaos. Another roar, and lava erupted from the cracked ground.

"Twintails! What the fuck is this!?" Deji yelled over the noise, his eyes a bright red. Ara grit her teeth. Cero had never seen a face like that stain her beauty. She looked like a completely different person. She looked ready to kill.

"Crimson Fatalis."

Cero stilled.

Fatalis..

-

*"Aren't you scared? You're not a guardian. You could die," Cero whispered. The redhead stopped humming, and turned to look at the exo with a smile.*

*"You think I'll die so easily?" She grinned, walking on her knees and resting her hands and head on Cero's tighs.*

*"Of-ofcourse not. I was just asking," Cero stuttered. Ara was too close. She hadn't dealt with her in a few days, but the sudden touch caught her by surprise.*

*"You are right to. I used to be scared. Then I dealt with Fatalis," she laughed, and Cero tilted her head.*

*"Fata-what?"*

*"Fatalis. A terrifying monster, so powerful even an elder dragon the size of your tower flees from it," she explained, twirling her hair.*

*"And you killed it?" Cero wondered, receiving a nod and a bright smile in return.*

-

Shit.

She saw it's shadow approach, the lava still seeping out of cracks in the ground.

"I don't think my shield is strong enough for this.." Alric whipped his head back to Cero, his face showing a plea for help.

There was none. There would come none. They were alone and they were facing something Ara called terrifying.

Their silent communication was cut short hy another earthquake. Cero looked before her, and saw something she'd never seen before.

Crimson Fatalis. Proudly standing in front of them while bathed in lava.

"Something's wrong. It's core.." Ara said, trying to focus her sight in the fires and distorted light.

"Core?" Deji repeated, looking at the monster. It was waiting for them, it seemed. The calm of the beast in the midst of the roaring sky and red hot air was in and of itself more intimidating than anything Cero had ever encountered. 

"The core is black. Normally a Crimson Fatalis core is bright like the lava you see on the floor."

"It's tainted with darkness. The same darkness we destroyed in the black garden," Cero said, readying her LMG.

"Regardless of what's it got going on, we need to kill it now," Ara said and left the shield, chugging some sort of glass bottle with orange liquid in it before unsheathing her Rimeblade, causing Fatalis to react with a flap of it's wings.

"Ara!" Cero yelled, trying to reach out to her. Was she insane!?


	41. Chapter 41

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I wrote this at 2 am sorry if it's confusing

She'd never gone on a solo quest against a fatalis, so ill prepared and with the stakes so high. She didn't have anything familiar on her but her Rimeblade and some items she scurried to get and already used most of during the way down here.

Like Cero yelled, she was insane, but she had to do something. Anything. This havic wreaking monster was so powerful, fused together with the darkness that was the enemy of Cero's god. It was suicide, yet Ara was tranquil. She danced along the meteors, lava and cracks in the floor like she had done many times before in the Ingle Isles and Volcanic Hollows. This was her job. Her life. Sanity be damned, it was the thing she excelled at and she would keep that part of herself until the very end.

Closing in the distance with the Crimson Fatalis waiting for her, she readied her stance to inflict the first attack. It hit, but barely so much as scratched the Black Dragon's scales.

It retaliated with a gust of wind from its wings, the black core of it's chest bumping uncomfortably in her vision as she flew back against the statue wall. She changed up her blade's direction to her back to dull the impact with her weapon, but it still cracked the stone.

Ara was fine. She could only feel one thing and that was to protect and see it through. So she got up and charged once more. She vaguely heard the guardians speak in her comms, but it was like her hearing was obstructed by the Fatalis' gaze. It was challenging her, testing her.

Like the Vex.

Grabbing onto the hilt of her sword tightly, she jumped into the air and used the momentum to slash through the core. It was a weak point, and regardless of how tough the scales seemed to be over it's whole body, it's chest was always softer. Every record known about black dragons stated that. So it was her plan. Simple.

After her attack landed, Ara threw up a smoke nut in the air and hit it with the tip of her weapon to create a cloud of smoke, a distraction to move towards it's back legs to obstruct it's movement.

Usually she'd use her glaive at home to try and forcefully knock it to the ground while stabbing it repeatedly in the back, but she had limited options, so this one would have to do.

As she was about to twirl her body to create a stronger attack, she noticed Cero's sniper gleaming in the distance a split second before the piercing sound reached her ears and the Fatalis staggered backwards. This was her chance.

Ara quickly swung her Rimeblade, the ice useless in the devastating temperatures and creating a cloud of mist as she landed the hit, causing the Crimson Fatalis to roar in anger.

It turned it's head to the tall hunter who sheathed her sword and tried to dash away from it's mouth, but it was too late. 

As if time came to a slow, Ara saw it's maw open reach for her arm. It closed around her limb, the sound of skin tearing and bone snapping filling her ears. Ara's vision was clotted with black spots.

It had taken her arm.

She screamed, a guttoral, terrified sound that caused nothing but agony around her. No. She was no match. No match at all. Her sword arm was gone. She was bleeding out, watching Fatalis spit out her limb like it was nothing. Like it wasn't her most important part of herself. She could lose anything else. A leg. Two legs. She'd crawl. As long as she could use her sword arm, she'd be fine. She'd be fine!

Tears spilled down her bloodied face, she was furious. So furious. She let it touch her. She wasn't ready and now look what happened.

Ara unsheathed her sword with her left arm, uselessly swinging it at the Fatalis that seemed to revel in her despair.

"Target, ready," she heard in her comms, and she remembered she wasn't alone.

"Fire," a deeper voice rang, and in a split second, a blinding light and deafening blow numbed her senses. She could only stare at the white, scorching light as it pierced the chest of the darkness embedded monster.

What?

The redhead fell to her knees, clutching the stump that was left of her arm.

The fatalis shrieked, stumbled backwards and summed more meteors in it's rage. It was primal, the eyes of it dark like a moonless night. The entire area rumbled and she saw a purple sphere appear over her. A shield. Ara turned her head, seeing Alric stand next to her, Cero's sniper on his back while still holding the shield, and Cero and Deji disassemble what seemed like a massive weapon.

"Cero told me to try and back you up, but I'm terrible with snipers," He said hurriedly as he kneeled beside her after deeming his sentinel strong enough. He cursed under his breath, looking at the pathetic stump.

"Don't look at the monster. Those two have it covered," the awoken fully entered her vision as he summoned his ghost between all the chaos to stop her bleeding.

"What.. was that beam?" Ara asked, then coughed. She grit her teeth.

Alric sighed, making sure she didn't have any other wounds. "That, my dear strawberry, is Deji's prototype Cinder. If you've ever seen his apartment, he's got an entire room dedicated to creating highly illegal weapons that could kill anything that stepped too close to it. The reason I'm away from it is because that thing is so hot it will turn me into burnt steak. That's why it's a prototype. I didn't know he had it with him," Alric explained, laying her down on the ground which was also a purple hue.

"He's-" a cough, "a crazy bastard, isn't he?" She smiled weakly, causing Alric to return her expression.

"I'm sorry, Ara. I should've been there for you," he said quietly, tracing the now painless skin above her wound.

"You are. You did what you could," was all the Wyverian girl replied.

The meteors and rumbling stopped as the lava cooled into a solid. Cero and Deji approached the two closest to the Fatalis, or what remained of it.

Alric stepped away and Ara saw the dead body of the Black Dragon. It was lifeless with a giant, sizzling hole through it's chest.

"Ara!" The exo girl cried and crouched in front of the redhead who just stared at purple eyes.

"We can fix this! We can, we have the tech. We have nanytes! Amanda can help you, Alric has-"

Ara pressed her bandaged hand on Cero's cheek and smiled, causing the smaller girl to stop her ramble.

"You did a good job. You saved us. Deji, too," the blademaster said, causing Cero's breath to hitch.

"You lost your arm! I didn't do shit! It was just Deji and Alric," she raised her voice, static increasing. "I just watched you get bitten.."

"And you didn't let your emotions get in the way," Ara kept her voice kind, playing with Cero's antenna.

"You almost died. You almost died and I watched it happen," the black painted guardian grabbed Ara's shoulders, burying her face in the crook of the Wyverian's neck.

"But I didn't die. I told you, I can handle myself. Plus, you wouldn't be able to visit me on my birthday if I was dead, right?" Ara eyed the red warlock, who looked away instantly.

"I was so scared," she heard the exo hunter say, and Ara pressed her cheek against the side of Cero's head.

"We know what the Vex wanted. They wanted to create a mass of darkness embedded monsters to destroy worlds. They wanted to see what power that Fatalis held. That's why they let us live and descend. It doesn't explain why they tried to degrade our sanity, though," Deji thought out loud.

"Maybe to see what else they could salvage. The Vex are strange. The Infinite Forest is an example of that, just like the Black Garden," Alric sat down, placing the Borealis next to him. He looked around, but everything was barren.

Except..

"What's that?" He tilted his head, picking up the weapon again and looking through the scope.

"What do you see?" Ara asked, gently pushing Cero off of her, who seemed in sort of a daze. Flux was still floating around the redhead's right side, shining light on torn muscles.

Alric zoomed in on the scope, his brow furrowing in confusion. "A child."

"A.. what now?" Deji took the sniper and peered towards the same angle, muttering curses under his breath as he tossed down the weapon and pointed his finger at it. "Why in the Traveler's name is there a tiny homeless looking kid holding Cayde's teleporter?" He asked no one in particular gruffly.

Alric's eyes widened and whipped his head back to the small human hiding behind a broken statue.

"Hey kid! Come on out!" The awoken yelled. The tiny child tip-toed towards them with a slight limp, clutching the teleporter close to her chest.

"This is ridiculous. If we'd known about the fact that thing could bring us here it would've saved us everything we gave up on this stupid mission. Everything! All this shit cost the strawberry her arm!" Deji yelled, gritting his mouth plates in frustration.

"Just let the girl speak before you lose your mind," Cero said in a small voice. Ara was quiet.

"How'd you get here, kid?" Alric asked as she stopped in front of the sitting titan.

"I climbed down," she answered.

"Fucking hell," Deji sighed, kicking a pebble.

"Hello, Lissa," Ara said with a kind smile, and all the guardians fixed their curious gaze on the redhead.

"Heya miss Ara! Mr. Vanguard told me to find you guys. I kept trying to convince him and he seemed real upset to send me down here, giving me this thing and saying "If anything scary tries to kill you, open this and press the large button with your palm.". I told him I am used to scary places and I went alllllll the way down to come pick everyone up! It was real hard to get here and I sprained my ankle during the earthquakes but I'm ok! What happened to your arm, miss Ara? Why is there a dead Fatalis next to us?" Lissa talked like a wind up toy, and Ara just pat her head.

"You did well. I'll make sure to tell his Immenseness when we return to the guild. Is everyone on the surface okay?"

"Yes! We took out the leader baddies! Everyone went back to this place called the Tower but I hid and went down here because mr. Vanguard seemed really worried about all of you," she placed down the teleporter, opening it and smiling a toothy smile.

"I'm extremely confused but let's go," Alric said, holding onto the device. All of them did the same, and a white flash followed up by slight nausea brought them back to a sunlit, grass covered area.

"There we go! Mr. Vanguard! They are here!" Lissa ran towards a certain direction, and Ara sighed. It was as if a ton of weight just got lifted from her shoulders. Everyone was safe. They stopped the Fatalis and Vex army.

"Who is that kid?" Cero asked the question her whole team wanted to ask, and Ara laughed.

"Lissa's a scout, trained by the guild to find things. She's been part of over 100 missing person cases and always found them, or their remains. I guess she managed to tell Cayde, judging by the fact she found us," she nodded her head towards the vanguard hunter now hugging her and simultaniously scolding her. Then he threw a thumbs up to Parallax and Ara.

"Well. Mission clear, I guess. Let's go back to the tower and never do this again," Cero said, helping Ara up and summoning Codex. The redhead watched her talk to her ghost, and she realized she'd been lucky. Her sword arm was nothing in comparison to her life. Ara was mortal. She could've died and never be able to see those purple eyes anymore.

If losing her arm was the price to pay for Cero, then so be it.


	42. Chapter 42

"We gotta do something!" Cero yelled as she watched Ara ignore her team and run towards the bulking monster in front of them. It was looking straight at Cero, but quickly averted it's gaze towards the redhead.

"I have something that might work but it's dangerous and needs time to be ready," Deji said to her, opening his comm holo and searching through his heaps of items frantically.

Cero stood after the meteors calmed and watched Ara get launced by just a gust of wind from the Fatalis. "Anything. As long as it kills that thing. Ara can't hunt it," the exo said and tried not to let rage overtake her once she saw the Black Dragon just wait for the blademaster to dash to her death once more. It didn't change position, just stood there.

"Help me transmat the pieces. It's a prototype incinerating beam that obliterates everything in front and around it. I can't have you close to it once we turn it on, Alric," the warlock gave a wary look at the awoken standing by him, and the titan's eyes widened.

"You mean the Cinder you showed me the blueprints off a few months back!? that thing will melt you too, not just me!" A wisp of white hair entered Cero's vision, and Alric was now towering over Deji, an unreadable expression on his pale face.

"This isn't the time to argue. Besides, I know what I'm doing," the warlock didn't seem to mind the closeness of the titan, and Cero saw the taller man sigh and pinch the bridge of his nose in irritation.

"'Ric, take my sniper and back Ara up. Try and give her a fighting chance," Cero gave her Borealis to the pacifist, who just stared at the weapon.

"Alric!" Cero cried, desperate. "If you want to protect her, this is the only way you can, this thing is an abomination that will destroy us all if Deji's plan fails!"

Alric quietly looked at his leader and lowered his shield, leaving the two guardians assembling the Cinder. Cero saw him mount up behind a broken statue and ready his shot, waiting for a chance. Turning back, the exo girl watched Deji transmat the last piece.

"Okay, this goes here, then this needs to be attached to the battery and then I need you to place these wires at the back of my head and my core," he held up two wires. One blue, one black. Cero's eyes widened just like Alric's had a moment ago.

"You're going to use yourself as the ammo?!" Her eyes were bright, scared. Deji nodded.

"I can higher my internal volts and mix it with my light when I have my ghost healing me, and the Fatalis is only focused on Ara. Trust me," he said, patting her head. Cero was at a loss for words.

Trust me, he said.

Cero gave a grim nod, beginning to attach the pieces and the wires. Deji removed his jacket, his rusted core on full display.

"Do it, Birdie," he said with a smile and she closed her eyes as she jammed the wire inside the core, causing a spark to emit from it.

A sniper shot was heard, and Cero turned to see Alric struggle with her weapon. Had he missed? No. A look at the Fatalis revealed it to be staggering slightly backwards, but Ara saw it as a chance.

"Stop!" The nightstalker screamed, but it was too late, and the Fatalis closed it's maw around Ara's arm.

"Fuck, fuck!!", she ran towards the scope, and lined it up with the chest of the monster.

"Target, ready," she quickly said, watching Fatalis rip the redhead's arm from her body and heard a terrifying scream.

"Fire!"

She heard Deji groan in pain, and a pool of light was released from the muzzle of the Cinder. Mainframe was healing the warlock as he repeatedly got damaged, his core being depleted almost as fast as his ghost healed him.

This was madness. The beam had completely torn through the monster and even destroyed the darkness inside. Alric had used his sentinel to protect Ara from the onslaught of meteors, and the rumble stopped the moment Fatalis fell to the ground.

"Fuck," Deji muttered as he tore off the wires from his body and transmatted the weapon back to his inventory as if he didn't almost kill himself. He was smoking from his core.

After taking in everything that just happened, Cero came back to her senses and started running towards the purple hue.

-

Back at the tower, it was filled with Wyverians. People were surrounding Cero's ship and congratulated them when they got out, but Cero was far from happy.

"Where's holliday?" She asked a random titan, and he pointed to the meeting hall. Cayde was carrying the redhead, who passed out from exhaustion not too long ago, and her team followed the vanguard hunter. Lissa had disappeared somewhere in the hangar.

The noise had dissipated the moment Ara was carried out of the ship, and worried whispers filled their ears. Cero looked down at her feet. She wasn't used to her team being the center of attention.

The walk was short, and they saw Amanda Holliday quite quickly in the midst of the chaos. Everyone including her was running around, trying to provide food and lodging for the Wyverians. Ikora was conversing with a small girl sporting a bow and quiver on her back.

"Oh, no," the blone mechanic said once she noticed the blademaster's condition.

"Please, help her," Cero took Amanda's hand, and she nodded with determined eyes, squeezing back reassuringly and telling Cayde to follow her to the medical wing.

"Parallax," Cero heard Zavala's deep voice and turned towards her commander.

"What happened?" He asked. His voice was far from authorative, his eyes worried.

A beat of silence.

"Take a seat," Cero said, leaning against the map table.

-

"We need to have guardians stationed inside the citadel heart. This isn't over yet. We stopped the immediate threat but we need to have power down there if we want to keep everyone safe. The portals can be managed by sentries," Cero concluded her report and Codex closed his recordings. Zavala was quiet. It was Ikora who spoke up.

"You have clearly been through a lot, and so has your Wyverian hunter. I agree that we should station our guardians there, and I will dispatch my hidden to see if there are any traces left of the Vex in Wyveria. To celebrate this victory, I permit you and the red girl to travel between worlds," the dark skinned warlock said with a hint of a smile, and Cero slumped. Finally.

Finally.

She'd have some peace.

"I'm going to check in with Holliday and Cayde. Tell them what's happening," She got up, and left with a quick stride.

Ara could be helped. Ara's mother, too.

They'd have a chance.

So why was she still anxious? Maybe because of the fact Ara might not be able to return to her world as a hunter. Maybe because she couldn't stop replaying the Fatalis ripping Ara apart in her head. Maybe because she had passed out, and Cero couldn't see those grey orbs.

Her breath hitched, and she quickened her pace to the medical wing.


	43. Chapter 43

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A little short, but they talk. <3

Watching Cero leave made him nervous, the tiny leader walking like she was still in the Citadel. She was tense, so tense Alric had heard some of her springs creak under pressure during the deafening silence after her report. He thought only Deji had that problem, but he was wrong.

Speaking of Deji, he didn't want to be alone with him, but he knew he'd have to confront him about everything that happened. He'd been dancing around the topic eversince they met up again and frankly he wasn't ready.

Alric remembered bits and pieces of their interactions, but it got really vague and foggy when Cayde had asked them to pick Cero and Ara up. He mostly remembered the time where Deji would calm him down after nightmares and allow him to stay.

But.. he didn't remember the kiss. It was all just.. obscured by something. He wanted to remember, he really did, but he just couldn't.

And Deji had to suffer because of it.

He looked at the warlock, who was worse for wear. Maybe he'd replace Deji's core after he finally talked with the exo. It was damaged by the Cinder after all. Deji was willing to sacrifice himself to save everyone, but all Alric could think about was how his teammate was an idiot for intentionally hurting himself. He didn't want to lose Deji. Ever. Even if they had a terribly rough start, he kept returning to the exo. Deji had changed. He was still him, but whenever the warlock looked at him, he felt like a whole new person was gazing at him. No cold stares, just eyes so full of untold emotions it was impossible to believe he was an exodus. Even in the heat of battle, even when Deji picked up Ara's bleeding body. It felt like Alric was the only one in Deji's world, and that didn't change even when he suffered amnesia.

Deji met Alric's gaze, and simply jerked his head to the exit of the meeting hall. Alric followed, nerves out of control.

-

Going to Deji's apartment felt so estranged all of a sudden that he became nauseous. He wanted things to go right, but there was always a creeping chance that the bad thoughts were real, and that he would not end up in Deji's arms like he had the priveledge of before.

"Get inside, you're just standing there," Deji sighed, holding the door. He was already kicking off his combat boots, and raised a brow at the awoken. Alric quickly caught up and went inside the messy apartment.

Alric bit his lip when he looked around the living room. "Sorry, I don't really know how to talk about this," he admitted and earned a snort from the warlock, who kicked a few loose pieces of sparrow parts off the couch.

"C'mon, we'll figure it out," he said, sitting down and waiting for Alric to do the same. The titan held his breath as he approached the comfy couch, memories of their movie nights, holding eachother like it was the most natural thing. Like they were just meant to be totgether.

Alric sat down, carefully taking off his heavy gauntlets and gloves as he skimmed over what he wanted to say. He felt like he didn't belong here after losing those important memories.

The warlock wasted no time in waiting, just getting straight to the point. "You said you don't remember anything starting from the strawberry. So you still got the part where Cero was missing, right?" Deji started, surprising the awoken. "If that's the case then I don't think a lot changed."

"Then why did you run? Why did you just leave me in the medical wing?" Alric blurted out what he had been thinking about for so long, and he saw Deji's face fall.

"When you woke up and said you don't remember anything, I couldn't really.. deal with it. I say bad things when I get worked up, so I wanted to avoid upsetting you-"

Alric cut him off, only belatedly realizing his pent up emotions were overflowing now that all the action was gone. "I was miserable, you just left me to deal with this alone, Cero was mute! I wanted.. you, by my side. Like before. You hurt me," white eyes were boring holes in Deji's artificial ones, which were turning a shade of orange.

The exo looked down, breaking eyecontact. "I'm sorry, I never dealt with anything like this before."

"Just promise me," Alric placed his hand on Deji's core, feeling the soft thrum of it, slightly erratic due to damage, "Promise me you won't leave, not again," he pleaded, and didn't get a verbal reply in return, instead Deji buried his cold metal face in the crook of Alric's neck, holding him close. A nod followed.

The awoken felt himself relax, like some looming shadow finally stopped watching over him. All he wanted was for them to be together without the awkward stares, without the drawn out silences. He didn't even have energy left to throw a fit at his impossible teammate, he was done fighting for a while.

"Bed?" Deji asked after a while, and Alric chuckled. It was the first time Deji had willingly initiated anything, and Alric just wanted to hold him close forever. Usually it had been him, giving obscene hints towards the exo, sometimes just to rile him up. Actions spoke louder than words, he found out after spending more time with Deji.

"Yeah," he said, and kissed the cold metal of Deji's temple, breaking the hug and allowing the exo to guide him to the bedroom that started the months long rollercoaster they embarked on.


	44. Chapter 44

Ara woke up with a wince. There was a dull ache in her right shoulder, and she wondered why. Her Nargacuga scar was on her left shoulder.

Opening her eyes, everything was way too bright, too white.

Where was she?

She heard some kind of beeping noise, steady and droning. Her head was spinning, swaying. She closed her eyes.

No, not good.

The beeping noise increased speed as she started to panic. What happened?

Opening her eyes once more and actually looking around, she saw Cero was sleeping to her left, holding her hand that had a few wires attached to it, a needle poking in her arm.

Just how long had she been out of it?

She tried to speak but her voice was nowhere to be found. She wanted to grab her throat with her right arm, but no arm lifted and her throat still hurt.

Wait.

She looked over to her right, and to her horror she saw what looked like an arm, but-

Her eyes widened.

She screamed and thrashed at the sight, clawing at the metal frame of the robotic limb attached to her shoulder. The beeping noise became even faster.

This woke Cero up, and she felt two gloved hands on her cheeks, turning her face away from the unfimiliar thing towards the exo girl. Hers.

Cero was alive and well.

Ara started crying quite abrubtly, unable to control her emotions as she looked at the unharmed guardian petting her bangs out of her face soothingly.

"Help is coming. You're gonna be fine," Cero's artificial voice reached her ringing ears, and she sobbed, looking up at the ceiling.

Not a moment later she heard a door slide open and a curtain being drawn. A human nurse about the size of the exo came in and started prodding random places. Ara grimaced, still refusing to look at the weird arm laying limply by her frame.

"What.. what happened to me?" She slurred in Wyverian, so tired she could barely talk.

"..Our mission was a success. Guardians are now stationed around and inside the citadel. Fatalis has been defeated and we made it out alive thanks to your friend," Cero left one part out. Why didn't she just tell her? It was so obvious what Ara meant.

"Cero.. I meant this," she whispered while she felt the nurse poke away and away, and a sudden sting made her move away from the woman.

Ara had never felt so vulnerable in her life. The nurse looked at her for a second before smiling ruefully, and left them both to talk, exiting the room to go and do whatever nurses on Earth did.

"Cero, please tell me why my arm is gone," Ara choked out and grabbed the gloved hand on top of her hair. She heard the guardian suck in a breath.

"Fatalis took.. it. I- I talked to Holiday, demanded her to give you a new one.. I'm sorry, I didn't have enough time! I should've been there," Cero went off like a time bomb. "I- I know it's your good arm, and this new one- with practice, you can be okay! You can be-" Cero stopped talking as Ara just let go of her hand and gazed at the complex looking, metal limb.

It was black with red streaks, matching her hair. Her battle scars were nowhere to be found on the polished material. And no matter how hard she tried, she couldn't lift it up.

Her sword arm was gone.

"Cero.." she sighed.

"Y-yes?"

"I'm sorry I made you worry," Ara turned her gaze towards those purple LEDs, and saw the small robot just slump in front of her like the only thing that'd kept her running was nervous energy.

"I'm just glad you're awake," Cero said in response, and gently placed her hand on Ara's cheek.

"What happened to my hunters?" The redhead asked. Are they still in the last city?"

"Went home after guardians found a stable Vex portal leading to the Everwoods. Wonder guided them together with Avon in case an unusual situation needed to be reported back to base or something was still hiding over there," Cero told her. It had been such a long time since they were able to talk without impending doom just waiting around the corner. The exo's words weren't laced with worry, and that made Ara smile despite her own shitty predicament.

But then it dawned on her.

"Wait, stable portal? You mean it doesn't have to be destroyed?" She frowned, sitting up a little. The metal arm was just dragging on the sheets.

"Oh, yeah. I should talk to Zavala about your mother. You guys made a deal, after all. I'll need directions, but I can pick her up if you want. Beats a random squad doing a half assed job," Cero cocked her head with a smile. Ara nodded excitedly before realizing her head was still spinning, and she groaned.

The nightstalker pressed a small hand on Ara's torso, "Rest, I'll come back in a few hours to update you."

Ara watched her for a few seconds, but then nodded and relaxed a bit. She never heard Cero's footsteps, but the door was opened and a moment later the nurse was back to prod away at her skin again, and this time she had food with her.

-

The next time she woke up was less frightening. The room was still too white for her liking, but Cero was back, and she looked happy.

"My fireteam will pick up your mother. Can you tell me the name of the village she's at?" She sat down on the stool next to the bed, transmatting her holopad from thin air, waiting for a reply.

"It's called Waeldeport. It's a fishing town neighbouring Jumbo village. It might take a while to get there, since it's surrounded by the sea," Ara explained, instincitively reaching for her hip pocket where she always kept a world map, but finding it nowhere on her. "Where's my stuff?" She frowned.

"Oh. It's in the armory. Holiday had to desinfect it and stuff. There was a bunch of uh.. Fatalis saliva on it. Had darkness mixed in with it," Cero grimaced, standing up again as she noted down the name of Ara's birthplace.

Ara sat up, taking the exo's hand. "There's a map in one of my pouches. It should help you out there," she said, hating for having to leave Cero alone in her own world. She wanted to come with, dammit.

Cero noticed her discomfort. "I'll be back soon, with your parents. We can transmat our ship now to make travel more easy," she said, holding up Codex.

"We synced with Wyveria while you were sleeping. Zavala already went to this place called Dundorma to talk to the man in charge of the hunters." The AI said, twirling his shell happily.

Ara gawked at the pair. "Wait, your commander just up and got inside the Elder Hall?! You need to be a G rank hunter to-"

"The tall man with white hair helped us," Cero grinned, and Ara sighed at the mention of the pale hunter. It was Wonder, no doubt.

"That guy.. I've only known him for a short while, but he's too cunning."

"Relax, everything went well in the end. Zavala and your guild leader chatted for quite a while. In the end, he won't allow us to do anything else besides sync up, though. Doesn't want us to meddle with nature. We also need to report to Zavala if we enter Wyveria, and the portal is heavily guarded, bla bla. Long story short, we'll leave you guys be as long as there's no enemy of the Traveler at your doorstep," Cero explained the conditions, her hands waving it off as if she's heard it a hundred times by now.

"His Immenseness is very suspicious about anything that can potentially disturb the natural way of life, so I believe that quite easily," Ara giggled, remembering the first time she met the giant of a man. He stared at her for a full minute, then told her to stop picking all the berries after she finished a hunt. Those berries were needed to keep the vespoids healthy.

How he would defend vespoids were beyond her, but hey, nature.

"Anyway, I'm gonna go. My team's waiting," she said, bowing and turning with a grin. Ara waved, watching her go.

At least the nurse didn't immediately check on her.

**Author's Note:**

> Feedback is always appreciated!


End file.
